Men’s basketball SEC Power Rankings for Jan. 15: Vols move up

Last week: Lost to the Florida Gators and Auburn Tigers

Last rank: 8th

So far, Ben Howland’s Mississippi State Bulldogs are looking like they just benefitted from a terribly easy schedule in non-conference play. After all, four games into SEC competition, they still have the No. 139 ranked strength of schedule.

Meanwhile, their only Top 100 RPI wins are at home against the Dayton Flyers and then against the Arkansas Razorbacks. Now, Arkansas is a good win, so I don’t want to take anything away from that.

But otherwise, they’ve been nonexistent in non-conference games. As a result, we have to keep this team near the bottom of our SEC Power Rankings for now.

Sure, two of their three losses are to the Auburn Tigers, an elite team in the conference, and to the Florida Gators, another top team, on the road. But they also have a road loss to the Ole Miss Rebels. So they have hardly proven anything yet.

And until Mississippi State gets some solid conference wins and sees its schedule strength boost up, we have no choice but to keep this team here. How could you have such a bad schedule strength when you’re playing in the No. 3 ranked conference in the RPI overall with the No. 1 ranked overall schedule strength. That reveals atrocious non-conference scheduling.

Coming up, though, Mississippi State has a chance to get back on track and prove itself. They have a should-win game this week at home against the Vanderbilt Commodores. Then they have a chance to prove themselves with a road trip to the Alabama Crimson Tide. It’s about time for this schedule to test them.