The Villanova Wildcats are at the top of the Big East Conference in Ken Pomeroy's 2014-15 season projections, which he made available on Sunday night.
Pomeroy projects the 'Cats to go 13-5 in Big East play, and finish first in the conference in front of the Georgetown Hoyas, whose outlook is nearly as good: coming in at 12-6 in league play. 'Nova is also the No. 9 team in the preseason rankings, while the Hoyas are No. 22.
The rest of the list sees St. John's, Creighton and Providence in sequential order at at the No. 3, 4, and 5 positions. The Friars are the defending Big East Tournament Champions, while Creighton is coming off of an impressive season, and will be looking to enter the first year out of the Doug McDermott Era.
Xavier, who made the First Four in 2014, is projected to finish 6th in the Big East, while the projections don't like Butler or Seton Hall, who are projected to finish 7th and 8th. The Bulldogs will have Roosevelt Jones returning from injury, having missed all of the 2013-14 season, while the Pirates possess a prized recruiting class, led by Isaiah Whitehead.
Rounding out the conference projections are Marquette and DePaul. The Golden Eagles will be in transition under first year head coach Steve Wojciechowski, but will likely be aided by breakout candidate Deonte Burton. The Blue Demons unfortunately are projected to finish last by a considerable margin, as their Pomeroy expectancy is at .4178, while Marquette stands at .6593.
