Regarding Oshkosh and Whitman, I too was initially thinking that Oshkosh lost enough from that backcourt to mean they should not be the prohibitive favorite heading into the season, but I had a change of heart after seeing some of them in the tourney. They dominated most of the teams they played, and their frontcourt should easily be the best in the country if healthy, just an impossible group for anyone to match up against. The guards are a big loss, but Peterson had the look of a future all-American in the minutes he played, an athletic frosh who can play really well as a two-way role player on the biggest stage like that (including some great D vs. Francis if I recall) typically emerges as a prime time player when thrust into a bigger role They also return Vlotho and add a loaded recruiting class including an impressive-looking D2 transfer who should help right away and several top-20 Wisconsin recruits, one of whom is a guard. Between that group and other guys who were probably buried on the bench behind a veteran backcourt, they should still have a very good, and deep, backcourt. It also helps that most of the rest of WIAC looks (relatively) down right now with a lot of uncertainty, so Oshkosh should once again post a gaudy record in the best conference in the country.
Meanwhile, looking at the rest of the Elite 8, Williams loses its big three, Christopher Newport loses by far its best guy plus another key player, Swarthmore loses its top perimeter player and isn't nearly as deep as Oshkosh, they really need to have good luck with injuries (although they too should be very good again), Nichols loses its all-American from a team that was very thin, Guilford loses two of its three best guys, Wheaton loses Francis, Augustana loses three elite guys plus some depth, and Marietta loses two of its top three scorers plus another starter (though from a very deep team). Of the teams that made deep runs last year, Oshkosh looks to be the best positioned for a return engagement. I too think Emory looks absolutely loaded next year, as do Amherst and North Central, but they all have a lot of ground to make up vs. how Oshkosh has played in the last two NCAA tourneys. I actually think in the draft we collectively nailed what will very likely be most (at least 8-9, maybe all 10, although Midd might start out a few notches lower) of the preseason top ten (barring major recruit / transfer / injury / defection new) heading into the season. Marietta probably sneaks in, perhaps bumping Midd out. Maybe Guilford, CNU, or RMC squeezes in as well, all are top-20 teams for sure to start the season, but those three seem pretty closely grouped to me as all three lose important players. The only thing that is certain is that Oshkosh and Swarthmore should and will be ranked 1-2 in that order for sure. I felt like those ten teams plus the four others I just listed were the most obvious choices on paper, and after that, things start to get much more difficult to predict with either powerhouse teams who were decimated by graduation or unproven up-and-comers who return most of their rosters.
Whitman on the other hand I'm more skeptical of. There is still a lot of talent but they lose SO much to graduation, and part of what made them great was that they could throw waves and waves of really good players at you and wear you down over the course of the game. Next year's team on the other hand has only around 5-6 proven guys coming back. Austin Butler alone is a HUGE loss, he was a two-way monster and was critical to everything they did, especially on defense. I also didn't see anyone remotely like Jacob-Jones on the roster in terms of interior finishing, he was a very important player for them. And Stewart and Hewitt were both tremendous scorers. Duckett and Vickers will be one of the better backcourt in the country, Osborn is a great shooter, but up front they don't return a lot. Indeed, they return only 23 points, 6 rebounds, and 2 assists from their total team production in the season-ending loss to Williams. That's not a ton, even considering a lot of talent on the bench could have played more minutes elsewhere.
