Xavier Power Rankings: Week 15

After going 1-1 in each of the first seven weeks of the calendar year, Xavier snapped out of it with a 2-0 week last week. After last night's narrow loss at St. John's and with conference leader Villanova coming to town on Saturday, the possibility of following that success with an 0-2 week this week is suddenly looming large. There have been three games since we last did one of these, so this is going to cover a lot of ground.

13 and 12. Makinde London and Edmond Sumner
These guys did not play in any of the three games, making ranking them accurately a breeze.

11. Brandon Randolph
Randolph has been relegated to garbage time minutes, a far cry from the expanded role we hoped he would play this year. If it wasn't bad enough that Coach Mack sent Larry Austin into the game against St. John's when Dee had foul trouble, surely the fact that Larry ably answered the bell is the death knell of the Randolph era.

10. Sean O'Mara
He's big and brutish and pretty good at what he does well, but O'Mara is still more of a project than a player right now. You can see the footwork and the physical tools there, but next year is more likely than this year in terms of when O'Mara will really get rolling.

9. Larry Austin, Jr.
Austin came off the bench and gave Xavier five energetic minutes last night without turning the ball over. Could he be the start of the answer to Xavier's lack of depth at the point? I hope so. He sure looked fearless and effective at Madison Square Garden.

8. JP Macura
JP is finally back in rhythm, shooting 7-15 from beyond the arc in the last five games. He's still struggling to find other ways to influence games against more athletic teams, but he's a persistent pest on the top of the 1-3-1 and I don't think he's that bad as a man defender. Coming a rebound away from a nine-minute trillion against St. John's wasn't a good look for him.

7. James Farr
James had 18 boards in 41 minutes over the three games in question and shot 8-13 from the floor during that time. That's about what Xavier needs from him as a third big man going forward.

6. Jalen Reynolds
Positives: Jalen is a monster. Negatives: Jalen is still averaging 6.2 fouls per 40 minutes. Until that changes, he's going to be limited in what he can contribute to the cause.

5. Remy Abell
I don't know what to make of Remy. His minutes have been consistently lower than they were earlier in the year, and he's not finishing around the rim as well as he had been. He doesn't really hunt shots, nor is he that effective when he does, but he is a potentially explosive scorer when the team finds ways to get him involved.

4. Matt Stainbrook
I wish this guy had the athleticism of Jalen Reynolds. He doesn't though, so athletic front lines and aggressive doubles can limit his effectiveness. Hopefully Xavier doesn't draw either of those at any point in the Big East or NCAA Tournaments. What are the odds, right?

3. Dee Davis
You guys all read that glowing article I wrote about Dee after he won the Crosstown Shootout for us, right? He rewarded me by shooting 3-10/2-5/1-2 with 5 assists and 8 turnovers in the next two games. He's still hard to replace because, you know, we don't have anyone to replace him with, but he really needs to focus on passing to his own dudes. His recent 7-10 from behind the arc is reassuring though.

2. Myles Davis
Myles is a good scorer, but he's still just a step shy of being a guy you can throw the ball and tell him to go get a basket. He's at his best finding space without the ball and then shooting over or attacking defenders on the close out. He's either a hair short or a hair slow to really dominate the Big East; matchups like the athletic St. John's guards will give him trouble.

1. Trevon Bluiett
Still the team's leading scorer. Trevon looked afraid of the game against UC, but he bounced back against Butler and St. John's and is visibly developing as the season goes on. He's going to be a go-to guy very soon. He's 19-22 (86.4%) from the line in February. He has ably filled the four in the starting lineup and rebounds like a larger man. Welcome back to the top, Trevon.