Underrateds have great records, fewer resources

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We bill a team as a world-beater, and then it loses before we predict it should and we thrash it as being overrated. Or we get tired of how much a good team is talked or written about and lash out by calling that team overrated. If a team fails to live up to our lofty expectations, we peg that team with the dreaded overrated tag.

Of course, to say that a team is overrated is not to say that the team isn't any good; rather, it is a backhanded slap that means the team isn't as good as we thought it would be. The overrated label isn't always about the team or its flaws; it's about us, too. To be overrated you have to be rated in the first place, and we in the media are in charge of rating teams. If we are wrong, we have to blame someone, and we usually blame the team itself.

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Jay Bilas

College Basketball analyst

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• College basketball analyst for ESPN and ESPN Insider
• Played and coached at Duke
• Practicing attorney