As of this week, we may know which 12 Division I men's college basketball teams are still in contention to win the 2024 national championship. Emphasis on "may."
This is because the last 19 national champions have all been ranked in the top 12 in their respective season's Week 6 AP poll. In fact, Week 6 has outperformed polls from any other week over those nearly two decades, in terms of spotting the soon-to-be champion.
Beginning with the 2003-04 season, the average Week 6 ranking of the eventual national champion has been 4.7. No other week throughout the season ranks the eventual winner so highly, not even polls from March (e.g., Week 17, which averages out to 7.3).
Congratulations are therefore in order for the following teams, the top 12 in this season's Week 6 AP poll:
What is this strange, predictive power displayed by Week 6? Why would early December's conventional wisdom outperform evaluations from February or even March when it comes to picking champions?
Consider three factors that may help explain why this particular week's poll has outperformed all other weeks in terms of championship forecasting.
Our learning curve in any season may be more front-loaded than we think
If we start in December 2023 and go back year by year, Week 6's streak of handing out top-12 rankings to eventual champions comes to a crashing halt with Carmelo Anthony and Syracuse in 2002-03. The Orange were way down in the "also receiving votes" category in Week 6 that season.
Jim Boeheim's champions may have been outliers in terms of their early-season ranking, but they did illustrate half of the dynamic that powers Week 6's strong track record.