The Hunt for the Most Interesting Team in the World is the Dagger's 2009-10 countdown preview series. Check out the overriding principles here.

Last year's record: 27-8 (16-2 MAAC)

2009-2010's toughest games: at Temple, at Georgia Tech, at Northern Iowa

Primary attraction: Can Siena become the first team since 1990 to win three straight MAAC titles and, in turn, continue its quest to become the Gonzaga of the east?

Three items of undeniable interest:

1. Dealing with the hype -- The Saints got more votes in the Associated Press preseason poll (112) than Notre Dame (107), Syracuse (83), UCLA (63), Florida (53), Wake Forest (50), Xavier (42), Gonzaga (37) and Pittsburgh (4). That's no surprise coming off a season in which Siena earned a school-best No. 9 seed in the NCAA tournament and advanced to the second round, where they gave No. 1 Louisville all it could handle. But is it too much? The Hunt isn't for making predictions, but I can already see how the season is going to go for Siena: They're the hot under-the-radar team in November, but will lose a few games in non-conference play, particularly with the tough games listed above. They'll be 5-3 or 4-4 the MAAC schedule starts and most people will forget about them. Then, very quietly, Siena will go something like 17-1 or 16-2 in-conference and come March they'll once again be the hot under-the-radar team.

2. Returning starters -- Siena returns four starters from last year's team which set a school record for wins. Edwin Ubiles was on the Naismith Award list and figures to be an All-MAAC pick once again. Ronald Moore and Alex Franklin will be looking to make the jump from the second team to the first. Oh, and coach Fran McCaffery will also be back, much to the chagrin of the major programs that continually chase him after every season.

3. Just-in'love Smith -- What I love most about the moniker of Siena's much-heralded transfer is that his surname is so common. Turn on a Siena game, and you'll just see a dude with the name SMITH written on the back of his jersey, blissfully unaware that his first name reads like the title to a Kanye West song. 

Old game programs rule: