Providence 74, Seton Hall 69 - every road win matters
High Point 56, Campbell 53 - and that wins the Big South and a NIT bid
Manhattan 80, Iona 77 (OT) - doesn't matter since Iona's already won the MAAC; Manhattan's on the NIT bubble
Washington 72, Washington St 49
Harvard 72, Cornell 47
Princeton 57, Yale 46 - all of a sudden, Harvard is 2 up in the Ivy with 3 to play. Clinching scenarios tomorrow - Yale at Penn, Columbia at Harvard
Saturday!
UMass at Dayton - Dayton has quality win chances everywhere down the stretch - time to start cashing in on them
Cincinnati at UConn - all of a sudden, Cincy's status as a protected seed in a bit of doubt
Vanderbilt at Tennessee - for the love of God, SEC
Mississippi St at Missouri - I swear to God, SEC
Texas Tech at Baylor - Baylor must, must hold serve in games like these
Louisville at Memphis - another chance for Louisville to work its way back up the S-Curve
Pittsburgh at Notre Dame - Pitts just has to win this game
Colorado at Utah - this is not a trivial spot for Colorado, be careful
Richmond at Rhode Island - mandatory for Richmond
St Joseph's at St Bonaventure - trickier spot than you think, but St Joe's has built up some equity
LSU at Florida - LSU visits the last chance saloon
Syracuse at Virginia - it's time for Virginia to prove they deserve a high seed
Texas at Oklahoma - pretty important pecking order game
Georgia at Arkansas - you know Georgia is winning this game, because SEC
BYU at San Diego - must hold serve, BYU
Oregon at USC - another must-hold game on the road for a bubble team
Creighton at Xavier - instant bubble elixir opportunity for X
Northwestern at Nebraska - must win to stay on the bubble
St Louis at VCU - critical game for both teams in terms of S-Curve
Minnesota at Michigan - kind of a free money shot for Minny; Michigan's playing for the 2 line
Kentucky at South Carolina - Kentucky is bringing the 8/9 game into play
California at Arizona St - still don't know how to order the Pac 12 teams
Iowa St at Kansas St - garden variety game with 2 lock teams
Kansas at Oklahoma St - free money shot for OSU
Gonzaga at St Mary's - no longer mandatory for Gonzaga, but would be nice
San Diego St at Fresno St - people don't seem to realize this team can still be on the 2 line
Friday, February 28, 2014
2/28 bracket
No thoughts, too lazy. Also enjoy a bonus NIT bracket.
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (26-2) vs. 16) High Point (13-13)/Alabama St (12-10)
8) VCU (21-7) vs. 9) Gonzaga (23-6)
@Orlando
4) Cincinnati (24-4) vs. 13) Mercer (19-8)
5) North Carolina (21-7) vs. 12) Louisiana Tech (22-6)
@Buffalo
3) Michigan St (22-6) vs. 14) Harvard (21-4)
6) Oklahoma (20-8) vs. 11) Minnesota (17-11)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (23-6) vs. 15) North Carolina Central (20-5)
7) UCLA (21-7) vs. 10) St Joseph's (20-7)
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (26-2) vs. 16) Robert Morris (19-11)
8) Colorado (20-8) vs. 9) G Washington (20-7)
@San Antonio
4) Iowa St (22-5) vs. 13) Belmont (21-8)
5) Louisville (24-4) vs. 12) North Dakota St (19-6)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (22-5) vs. 14) Boston (21-9)
6) Texas (21-7) vs. 11) Arkansas (19-9)
@Raleigh
2) Villanova (25-4) vs. 15) Georgia St (19-7)
7) New Mexico (22-5) vs. 10) California (18-10)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (29-0) vs. 16) Vermont (18-9)
8) Kansas St (19-9) vs. 9) Arizona St (20-8)
@San Diego
4) Virginia (24-5) vs. 13) Delaware (21-9)
5) UMass (22-5) vs. 12) Baylor (16-10)/Tennessee (16-11)
@Milwaukee
3) Michigan (20-7) vs. 14) Western Michigan (18-8)
6) Kentucky (21-7) vs. 11) Oklahoma St (18-10)/Xavier (18-9)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (22-6) vs. 15) Davidson (17-11)
7) Memphis (20-7) vs. 10) Stanford (18-9)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (26-2) vs. 16) Weber St (14-9)/Utah Valley (15-10)
8) SMU (22-6) vs. 9) Pittsburgh (21-7)
@Spokane
4) St Louis (24-3) vs. 13) Iona (19-8)
5) Ohio St (22-7) vs. 12) Green Bay (20-5)
@Spokane
3) San Diego St (22-3) vs. 14) Stephen F Austin (22-2)
6) Iowa (18-9) vs. 11) BYU (19-10)
@San Antonio
2) Creighton (23-4) vs. 15) UC Irvine (17-10)
7) UConn (22-6) vs. 10) Oregon (19-8)
1) St John's (18-11) vs. 8) Manhattan (20-7)
4) Dayton (19-9) vs. 5) Toledo (22-5)
3) LSU (17-10) vs. 6) North Carolina St (17-11)
2) Providence (18-10) vs. 7) Quinnipiac (19-9)
1) Georgetown (16-12) vs. 8) New Mexico St (20-9)
4) Southern Miss (22-5) vs. 5) Richmond (18-10)
3) Ole Miss (17-11) vs. 6) UTEP (18-9)
2) Florida St (16-11) vs. 7) Middle Tennessee (19-8)
1) Missouri (19-9) vs. 8) San Francisco (17-10)
4) Indiana (16-12) vs. 5) Indiana St (19-8)
3) Clemson (17-10) vs. 6) Georgia (16-11)
2) West Virginia (15-13) vs. 7) Maryland (14-13)
1) Nebraska (16-11) vs. 8) Tulsa (16-12)
4) Utah (16-9) vs. 5) Boise St (16-10)
3) Washington (15-13) vs. 6) St Mary's (20-9)
2) Marquette (17-11) vs. 7) Illinois (16-12)
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (26-2) vs. 16) High Point (13-13)/Alabama St (12-10)
8) VCU (21-7) vs. 9) Gonzaga (23-6)
@Orlando
4) Cincinnati (24-4) vs. 13) Mercer (19-8)
5) North Carolina (21-7) vs. 12) Louisiana Tech (22-6)
@Buffalo
3) Michigan St (22-6) vs. 14) Harvard (21-4)
6) Oklahoma (20-8) vs. 11) Minnesota (17-11)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (23-6) vs. 15) North Carolina Central (20-5)
7) UCLA (21-7) vs. 10) St Joseph's (20-7)
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (26-2) vs. 16) Robert Morris (19-11)
8) Colorado (20-8) vs. 9) G Washington (20-7)
@San Antonio
4) Iowa St (22-5) vs. 13) Belmont (21-8)
5) Louisville (24-4) vs. 12) North Dakota St (19-6)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (22-5) vs. 14) Boston (21-9)
6) Texas (21-7) vs. 11) Arkansas (19-9)
@Raleigh
2) Villanova (25-4) vs. 15) Georgia St (19-7)
7) New Mexico (22-5) vs. 10) California (18-10)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (29-0) vs. 16) Vermont (18-9)
8) Kansas St (19-9) vs. 9) Arizona St (20-8)
@San Diego
4) Virginia (24-5) vs. 13) Delaware (21-9)
5) UMass (22-5) vs. 12) Baylor (16-10)/Tennessee (16-11)
@Milwaukee
3) Michigan (20-7) vs. 14) Western Michigan (18-8)
6) Kentucky (21-7) vs. 11) Oklahoma St (18-10)/Xavier (18-9)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (22-6) vs. 15) Davidson (17-11)
7) Memphis (20-7) vs. 10) Stanford (18-9)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (26-2) vs. 16) Weber St (14-9)/Utah Valley (15-10)
8) SMU (22-6) vs. 9) Pittsburgh (21-7)
@Spokane
4) St Louis (24-3) vs. 13) Iona (19-8)
5) Ohio St (22-7) vs. 12) Green Bay (20-5)
@Spokane
3) San Diego St (22-3) vs. 14) Stephen F Austin (22-2)
6) Iowa (18-9) vs. 11) BYU (19-10)
@San Antonio
2) Creighton (23-4) vs. 15) UC Irvine (17-10)
7) UConn (22-6) vs. 10) Oregon (19-8)
1) St John's (18-11) vs. 8) Manhattan (20-7)
4) Dayton (19-9) vs. 5) Toledo (22-5)
3) LSU (17-10) vs. 6) North Carolina St (17-11)
2) Providence (18-10) vs. 7) Quinnipiac (19-9)
1) Georgetown (16-12) vs. 8) New Mexico St (20-9)
4) Southern Miss (22-5) vs. 5) Richmond (18-10)
3) Ole Miss (17-11) vs. 6) UTEP (18-9)
2) Florida St (16-11) vs. 7) Middle Tennessee (19-8)
1) Missouri (19-9) vs. 8) San Francisco (17-10)
4) Indiana (16-12) vs. 5) Indiana St (19-8)
3) Clemson (17-10) vs. 6) Georgia (16-11)
2) West Virginia (15-13) vs. 7) Maryland (14-13)
1) Nebraska (16-11) vs. 8) Tulsa (16-12)
4) Utah (16-9) vs. 5) Boise St (16-10)
3) Washington (15-13) vs. 6) St Mary's (20-9)
2) Marquette (17-11) vs. 7) Illinois (16-12)
Thursday, February 27, 2014
2/27 recap
bubble watch:
Arkansas 71, Kentucky 67 (OT) - signature road win and now Arkansas clearly has the 3rd best profile in this conference. Clearly in as of now, but they must defend their position. Kentucky has probably thrown away a chance at a 3 or 4 seed without a win over Florida
Marquette 75, Georgetown 73 - welp, G'town keeps clawing their way back onto the bubble then loses a tossup game to lose their grip. They're out of losses. Marquette is barely breathing and is doing more to mess up the rest of the conference
Gonzaga 70, Pacific 53
bad loss alerts:
Duquesne 71, St Louis 64 - so wait, St Louis wins all these tough games, has even tougher games coming up, and decides to lose at home in this one instead? What a waste of a mulligan. This is worth a seeding line or three.
Indiana 93, Iowa 86 - Iowa might lose a top-4 seed for good now. Indiana is still not close to the bubble, don't get excited
Penn St 65, Ohio St 63 - speaking of losing a top-4 seed...
Houston 77, Memphis 68 - what the hell is going on tonight? so many awful losses
holding serve:
Louisville 88, Temple 66
Southern Miss 78, FIU 66
VCU 85, Fordham 66
Louisiana Tech 55, Middle Tennessee 39 - by the way, the CUSA race is now a 4 team clusterfuck at 11-3 (USM, LaTech, MTSU, Tulsa), with UTEP one back after losing to Tulsa. 3 to go for everyone
small school watch:
North Florida 79, Mercer 76 (OT) - horrible home loss and Mercer has given the A-Sun title to FGCU...
Lipscomb 92, FGCU 71 - or not. still tied with 1 to play
Vermont 69, Stony Brook 53 - Vermont wins A-East
North Dakota St 82, South Dakota 54 - NDSU wins the Summit
Siena 72, Quinnipiac 70 - this gives the MAAC title to Iona
Stephen F Austin 103, New Orleans 63 - 15-0 in the Southland
Utah Valley 66, New Mexico St 61 (OT) - UVU 1 up with 2 to play now
UC Irvine 71, UCSB 60 - UCI is 1 up with 3 to play
Friday preview:
NEW S-CURVE!
High Point can win the Big South at home against Campbell
Providence at Seton Hall - mandatory for Provi
Iona at Manhattan - hey, Manhattan's on the NIT bubble
IvyWatch: Cornell at Harvard, Yale at Princeton
Arkansas 71, Kentucky 67 (OT) - signature road win and now Arkansas clearly has the 3rd best profile in this conference. Clearly in as of now, but they must defend their position. Kentucky has probably thrown away a chance at a 3 or 4 seed without a win over Florida
Marquette 75, Georgetown 73 - welp, G'town keeps clawing their way back onto the bubble then loses a tossup game to lose their grip. They're out of losses. Marquette is barely breathing and is doing more to mess up the rest of the conference
Gonzaga 70, Pacific 53
bad loss alerts:
Duquesne 71, St Louis 64 - so wait, St Louis wins all these tough games, has even tougher games coming up, and decides to lose at home in this one instead? What a waste of a mulligan. This is worth a seeding line or three.
Indiana 93, Iowa 86 - Iowa might lose a top-4 seed for good now. Indiana is still not close to the bubble, don't get excited
Penn St 65, Ohio St 63 - speaking of losing a top-4 seed...
Houston 77, Memphis 68 - what the hell is going on tonight? so many awful losses
holding serve:
Louisville 88, Temple 66
Southern Miss 78, FIU 66
VCU 85, Fordham 66
Louisiana Tech 55, Middle Tennessee 39 - by the way, the CUSA race is now a 4 team clusterfuck at 11-3 (USM, LaTech, MTSU, Tulsa), with UTEP one back after losing to Tulsa. 3 to go for everyone
small school watch:
North Florida 79, Mercer 76 (OT) - horrible home loss and Mercer has given the A-Sun title to FGCU...
Lipscomb 92, FGCU 71 - or not. still tied with 1 to play
Vermont 69, Stony Brook 53 - Vermont wins A-East
North Dakota St 82, South Dakota 54 - NDSU wins the Summit
Siena 72, Quinnipiac 70 - this gives the MAAC title to Iona
Stephen F Austin 103, New Orleans 63 - 15-0 in the Southland
Utah Valley 66, New Mexico St 61 (OT) - UVU 1 up with 2 to play now
UC Irvine 71, UCSB 60 - UCI is 1 up with 3 to play
Friday preview:
NEW S-CURVE!
High Point can win the Big South at home against Campbell
Providence at Seton Hall - mandatory for Provi
Iona at Manhattan - hey, Manhattan's on the NIT bubble
IvyWatch: Cornell at Harvard, Yale at Princeton
Bracketing information
I see fellow bracketologists already making mistakes. So as a final reminder, here's the bracket conflicts you need to be aware of:
1) San Diego St cannot play in San Diego in the first 2 rounds. The distances to Spokane and San Antonio are about equal; I'm starting to think SDSU will get sent to Spokane to clear up room for other eastern-based teams in San Antonio.
2) Memphis cannot play in the South bracket.
3) St John's cannot play in the East bracket.
4) Other two longshot conflicts still in play: NC State/Raleigh and Marquette/Milwaukee. We'll worry about Stetson, IUPUI, and Washington St only when we need to cross that bridge.
5) BYU cannot play in the East or Midwest regionals, and also cannot play in Raleigh, San Antonio, San Diego, and St Louis. Wonderful.
New bracketing rules this year, compared to last year:
1) In the old days, the top 3 teams from each conference had to be in 3 separate brackets. Now, the rule has changed such that the top 4 teams from each conference have to be in 4 separate brackets, BUT only if they are all top-4 seeds. Otherwise, they can intermingle within the same bracket. I would tend to think the selection committee will still try to uphold the previous rule as long as it fits in the bracket, but they have the freedom to put, say, Arizona and UCLA in the same regional now. This particular rule will likely come into play for the Big 10, though. It could get messy.
2) Conference mates that only meet once in the regular season can meet as early as the round of 32. Again, I'd imagine the selection committee will try to avoid the situation when possible, but now they have the freedom to create the situation instead of moving teams up or down a seed line. Conference mates that meet twice must avoid each other until the round of 16, still. Non-conference matchups can be repeated in the round of 32 and beyond.
1) San Diego St cannot play in San Diego in the first 2 rounds. The distances to Spokane and San Antonio are about equal; I'm starting to think SDSU will get sent to Spokane to clear up room for other eastern-based teams in San Antonio.
2) Memphis cannot play in the South bracket.
3) St John's cannot play in the East bracket.
4) Other two longshot conflicts still in play: NC State/Raleigh and Marquette/Milwaukee. We'll worry about Stetson, IUPUI, and Washington St only when we need to cross that bridge.
5) BYU cannot play in the East or Midwest regionals, and also cannot play in Raleigh, San Antonio, San Diego, and St Louis. Wonderful.
New bracketing rules this year, compared to last year:
1) In the old days, the top 3 teams from each conference had to be in 3 separate brackets. Now, the rule has changed such that the top 4 teams from each conference have to be in 4 separate brackets, BUT only if they are all top-4 seeds. Otherwise, they can intermingle within the same bracket. I would tend to think the selection committee will still try to uphold the previous rule as long as it fits in the bracket, but they have the freedom to put, say, Arizona and UCLA in the same regional now. This particular rule will likely come into play for the Big 10, though. It could get messy.
2) Conference mates that only meet once in the regular season can meet as early as the round of 32. Again, I'd imagine the selection committee will try to avoid the situation when possible, but now they have the freedom to create the situation instead of moving teams up or down a seed line. Conference mates that meet twice must avoid each other until the round of 16, still. Non-conference matchups can be repeated in the round of 32 and beyond.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
2/26 recap
protected seed watch:
Virginia 65, Miami 40
Michigan 77, Purdue 76 (OT) - near disaster that would've been worth a seed line
Villanova 67, Butler 48
North Carolina 85, NC State 84 (OT) - decent road win that top seeds are supposed to get. watch UNC's seed, it'll be good at this rate. NC State is done and dusted
Arizona 87, California 59 - Zona starting to look dominant again, and might yet catch Florida as #1 overall; for now they're back to #2. Cal isn't hurt too bad by this
lockbox watch:
UConn 61, USF 56
UMass 70, Rhode Island 67
bubble:
George Mason 69, Richmond 60 - catastrophic road loss will cause them to plummet well off the cutline
Iowa St 83, West Virginia 66 - WVU is out of chances, period
Pittsburgh 66, Boston College 59
Ole Miss 79, Alabama 67 - I suppose we'll continue to keep an eye for Ole Miss here
Tennessee 75, Mississippi St 68 - every road win is huge at this point
LSU 68, Texas A&M 49 - every win, period, is huge at this point
Northern Illinois 74, Toledo 66 - and that's probably the fatal blow
Illinois St 77, Indiana St 59 - and that's definitely the fatal blow
Fresno St 76, Boise St 56 - also a fatal blow, in case it wasn't already delivered
Texas 74, Baylor 69 - this doesn't hurt as bad for Baylor, but they need to overachieve in a game or two yet
Illinois 60, Nebraska 49 - marginal road loss for a marginal bubble team
Arizona St 76, Stanford 64 - you tell me what to do with the Pac-12, I give up
EIEIO watch:
Notre Dame 65, Georgia Tech 62
LaSalle 75, St Bonaventure 67
Buffalo 69, Ohio 64 - the MAC is weird this year
UNLV 78, Colorado St 70
small school watch:
High Point 70, VMI 67 - HP to the Big South lead
Boston 71, Army 70 - Boston +1 on American with 1 to play
Delaware 70, UNCW 57 - Delaware +1 on Towson with 1 to play
Belmont 94, SIU-E 75
Thursday:
Arkansas at Kentucky - this is absolutely Arkansas' last chance
Stony Brook at Vermont - this is likely for the A-East title
Middle Tennessee at Louisiana Tech - MTSU can take command of the CUSA race with this
Georgetown at Marquette - G'town desperately needs this
New Mexico St at Utah Valley - this is likely for the WAC title
Tulsa at UTEP - winner will have a legit chance at the CUSA title
Oregon at UCLA - Oregon can't afford too many more losses
Hold-serve bubble theather: Gonzaga at Pacific, VCU at Fordham, FIU at Southern Miss
Tuesday, February 25, 2014
2/25 recap
Minnesota 95, Iowa 89 - this will erase a few sins and get Minny back into the field of 68...need to just maintain at this point. Iowa bleeding seed lines
Wake Forest 62, Clemson 57 - catastrophic road loss, might lose the draft of the bubble
Xavier 65, St John's 53 - probably taking St John's out of my field now; Xavier solidifies a bit
St Joseph's 79, Dayton 53 - Dayton now close to losing the bubble status, but they have signature games remaining; St Joe's cruising along now
Georgia 71, Missouri 56 - ahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Hold-serve theater:
Florida 57, Vanderbilt 54
Wichita St 69, Bradley 49
Duke 66, Virginia Tech 48
Wisconsin 69, Indiana 58
San Diego St 90, San Jose St 64
New Mexico 67, Utah St 58
Kansas St 60, Texas Tech 56
NCCU 81, NJIT 62 - and with that, the first of 351 seasons in D1 basketball ends
Wednesday:
West Virginia at Iowa St - WVU is about out of time
North Carolina at NC State - NC State's last chance to get back in the bubble race
Alabama/Ole Miss, Tennessee/Mississippi St, Texas A&M/LSU - someone fire up the SEC chants
California at Arizona - free chance for Cal to earn lockbox status
Baylor at Texas - Baylor's recovered to the point that this isn't mandatory, but it would sure help
Nebraska at Illinois - legit bubble teams take care of this game, Nebraska
Stanford at Arizona St - winner earns bubble comfort
VMI at High Point - this is for the Big South lead and probably the NIT autobid
Wake Forest 62, Clemson 57 - catastrophic road loss, might lose the draft of the bubble
Xavier 65, St John's 53 - probably taking St John's out of my field now; Xavier solidifies a bit
St Joseph's 79, Dayton 53 - Dayton now close to losing the bubble status, but they have signature games remaining; St Joe's cruising along now
Georgia 71, Missouri 56 - ahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Hold-serve theater:
Florida 57, Vanderbilt 54
Wichita St 69, Bradley 49
Duke 66, Virginia Tech 48
Wisconsin 69, Indiana 58
San Diego St 90, San Jose St 64
New Mexico 67, Utah St 58
Kansas St 60, Texas Tech 56
NCCU 81, NJIT 62 - and with that, the first of 351 seasons in D1 basketball ends
Wednesday:
West Virginia at Iowa St - WVU is about out of time
North Carolina at NC State - NC State's last chance to get back in the bubble race
Alabama/Ole Miss, Tennessee/Mississippi St, Texas A&M/LSU - someone fire up the SEC chants
California at Arizona - free chance for Cal to earn lockbox status
Baylor at Texas - Baylor's recovered to the point that this isn't mandatory, but it would sure help
Nebraska at Illinois - legit bubble teams take care of this game, Nebraska
Stanford at Arizona St - winner earns bubble comfort
VMI at High Point - this is for the Big South lead and probably the NIT autobid
S-Curve 2/24
The 1 line: Florida (25-2), Wichita St (28-0), Arizona (25-2), Syracuse (25-2)
The 2 line: Kansas (21-6), Duke (22-6), Creighton (23-4), San Diego St (21-3)
The 3 line: Villanova (24-3), Wisconsin (22-5), Michigan St (22-6), St Louis (24-2)
The 4 line: Michigan (19-7), Cincinnati (24-4), Iowa St (21-5), Virginia (23-5)
The 5 line: North Carolina (20-7), Ohio St (22-6), Kentucky (21-6), Louisville (23-4)
The 6 line: Iowa (19-7), Memphis (20-6), UMass (21-5), UCLA (21-6)
The 7 line: Oklahoma (20-7), Texas (20-7), UConn (21-6), New Mexico (21-5)
The 8 line: SMU (22-6), Kansas St (18-9), Colorado (20-8), VCU (20-7)
The 9 line: Arizona St (19-8), California (18-9), Stanford (18-8), George Washington (20-7)
The 10 line: Gonzaga (22-6), Pittsburgh (20-7), BYU (19-10), St Joseph's (19-7)
The 11 line: Baylor (16-9), Georgetown (16-11), Xavier (18-9), St John's (18-10), Missouri (19-8)
The 12 line: Minnesota (16-10), Oregon (18-8), Green Bay (19-5), North Dakota St (18-6), Middle Tennessee (19-7)
The 13 line: Mercer (19-7), Belmont (20-8), New Mexico St (20-8), Iona (19-8)
The 14 line: Western Michigan (17-8), Delaware (20-9), Harvard (21-4), Boston (20-9)
The 15 line: Stephen F Austin (23-2), North Carolina Central (19-5), UC Santa Barbara (16-7), Georgia St (18-7)
The 16 line: Davidson (16-11), Vermont (17-9), Robert Morris (18-11), Weber St (13-9), VMI (13-10), Alabama St (12-9)
Bubble in:
Colorado, VCU, Arizona St, California, Stanford, George Washington, *Gonzaga, Pittsburgh, BYU
Next 4 in:
St Joseph's
Baylor
Georgetown
Xavier
Last 4 in:
St John's
Missouri
Minnesota
Oregon
Last 4 out:
Oklahoma St (17-10)
Providence (18-10)
Tennessee (15-11)
Richmond (18-9)
Next 4 out:
Arkansas (18-9)
Florida St (16-11)
LSU (16-10)
Dayton (19-8)
Bubble inception: WE NEED TO GO DEEPER
Nebraska (16-10)
West Virginia (15-12)
Southern Miss (21-5)
Clemson (17-9)
Indiana St (19-7)
Toledo (22-4)
Ole Miss (16-11)
*Green Bay
Marquette (16-11)
just off the consideration board: NC State, Utah, Maryland, St Mary's, Boise St, Louisiana Tech
The 2 line: Kansas (21-6), Duke (22-6), Creighton (23-4), San Diego St (21-3)
The 3 line: Villanova (24-3), Wisconsin (22-5), Michigan St (22-6), St Louis (24-2)
The 4 line: Michigan (19-7), Cincinnati (24-4), Iowa St (21-5), Virginia (23-5)
The 5 line: North Carolina (20-7), Ohio St (22-6), Kentucky (21-6), Louisville (23-4)
The 6 line: Iowa (19-7), Memphis (20-6), UMass (21-5), UCLA (21-6)
The 7 line: Oklahoma (20-7), Texas (20-7), UConn (21-6), New Mexico (21-5)
The 8 line: SMU (22-6), Kansas St (18-9), Colorado (20-8), VCU (20-7)
The 9 line: Arizona St (19-8), California (18-9), Stanford (18-8), George Washington (20-7)
The 10 line: Gonzaga (22-6), Pittsburgh (20-7), BYU (19-10), St Joseph's (19-7)
The 11 line: Baylor (16-9), Georgetown (16-11), Xavier (18-9), St John's (18-10), Missouri (19-8)
The 12 line: Minnesota (16-10), Oregon (18-8), Green Bay (19-5), North Dakota St (18-6), Middle Tennessee (19-7)
The 13 line: Mercer (19-7), Belmont (20-8), New Mexico St (20-8), Iona (19-8)
The 14 line: Western Michigan (17-8), Delaware (20-9), Harvard (21-4), Boston (20-9)
The 15 line: Stephen F Austin (23-2), North Carolina Central (19-5), UC Santa Barbara (16-7), Georgia St (18-7)
The 16 line: Davidson (16-11), Vermont (17-9), Robert Morris (18-11), Weber St (13-9), VMI (13-10), Alabama St (12-9)
Bubble in:
Colorado, VCU, Arizona St, California, Stanford, George Washington, *Gonzaga, Pittsburgh, BYU
Next 4 in:
St Joseph's
Baylor
Georgetown
Xavier
Last 4 in:
St John's
Missouri
Minnesota
Oregon
Last 4 out:
Oklahoma St (17-10)
Providence (18-10)
Tennessee (15-11)
Richmond (18-9)
Next 4 out:
Arkansas (18-9)
Florida St (16-11)
LSU (16-10)
Dayton (19-8)
Bubble inception: WE NEED TO GO DEEPER
Nebraska (16-10)
West Virginia (15-12)
Southern Miss (21-5)
Clemson (17-9)
Indiana St (19-7)
Toledo (22-4)
Ole Miss (16-11)
*Green Bay
Marquette (16-11)
just off the consideration board: NC State, Utah, Maryland, St Mary's, Boise St, Louisiana Tech
Monday, February 24, 2014
2/24 recap
Syracuse 57, Maryland 55 - Maryland's last stand fails, Syracuse stabilizes on the 1 line (for now)
Kansas 83, Oklahoma 75 - no harm for OU; Kansas is going to get to the 1 line if they win out
Oklahoma St 76, TCU 54
Southern 87, Alabama St 64 - Southern will win the SWAC, and with their ineligibility, the SWAC will lose their automatic NIT bid
Tuesday:
Iowa at Minnesota - Iowa bleeding seed lines; Minny bleeding at-large equity
Xavier at St John's - massive bubble game; winner's in my field and loser's probably out
Dayton at St Joseph's - an even more massive bubble game; Dayton can make up many positions; St Joe's can slowly approach lockbox status
Missouri at Georgia - is a road win at Georgia quality? heck if I know
Hold-serve theater everywhere else. Florida, Wichita, Duke, SDSU, Wisky, Kansas St, New Mexico with games they can't afford to lose to attain their goals. Clemson has a tricky road spot at Wake to stay on the bubble.
Kansas 83, Oklahoma 75 - no harm for OU; Kansas is going to get to the 1 line if they win out
Oklahoma St 76, TCU 54
Southern 87, Alabama St 64 - Southern will win the SWAC, and with their ineligibility, the SWAC will lose their automatic NIT bid
Tuesday:
Iowa at Minnesota - Iowa bleeding seed lines; Minny bleeding at-large equity
Xavier at St John's - massive bubble game; winner's in my field and loser's probably out
Dayton at St Joseph's - an even more massive bubble game; Dayton can make up many positions; St Joe's can slowly approach lockbox status
Missouri at Georgia - is a road win at Georgia quality? heck if I know
Hold-serve theater everywhere else. Florida, Wichita, Duke, SDSU, Wisky, Kansas St, New Mexico with games they can't afford to lose to attain their goals. Clemson has a tricky road spot at Wake to stay on the bubble.
2/24 bracket
Of course, BYU ruined everything. In order to fit them in, I had to chain reaction and move other seeds around. Green Bay to the 11 line, Xavier to the 12; Gonzaga and Stanford switch as well (with 3 Pac-12 teams on the 9 line, that was inevitable).
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (25-2) vs. 16) Robert Morris (18-11)/VMI (13-10)
8) SMU (22-6) vs. 9) Arizona St (19-8)
@Spokane
4) Iowa St (21-5) vs. 13) Belmont (20-8)
5) Ohio St (22-6) vs. 12) North Dakota St (18-6)
@San Antonio
3) St Louis (24-2) vs. 14) Harvard (21-4)
6) Iowa (19-7) vs. 11) Georgetown (16-11)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (22-6) vs. 15) North Carolina Central (19-5)
7) UConn (21-6) vs. 10) Baylor (16-9)
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (25-2) vs. 16) Vermont (17-9)
8) VCU (20-7) vs. 9) California (18-9)
@Orlando
4) Michigan (19-7) vs. 13) Mercer (19-7)
5) Kentucky (21-6) vs. 12) Xavier (18-9)
@Raleigh
3) Villanova (24-3) vs. 14) Delaware (20-9)
6) Memphis (20-6) vs. 11) Green Bay (19-5)
@Milwaukee
2) Creighton (23-4) vs. 15) Georgia St (18-7)
7) Texas (20-7) vs. 10) Pittsburgh (20-7)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (25-2) vs. 16) Davidson (16-11)
8) Kansas St (18-9) vs. 9) Gonzaga (22-6)
@San Diego
4) Cincinnati (24-4) vs. 13) New Mexico St (20-8)
5) North Carolina (20-7) vs. 12) Minnesota (16-10)/Oregon (18-8)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (22-5) vs. 14) Western Michigan (17-8)
6) UMass (21-5) vs. 11) BYU (19-10)
@San Antonio
2) San Diego St (21-3) vs. 15) UC Santa Barbara (16-7)
7) Oklahoma (20-7) vs. 10) Stanford (18-8)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (28-0) vs. 16) Weber St (13-9)/Alabama St (12-9)
8) Colorado (20-8) vs. 9) George Washington (20-7)
@Spokane
4) Virginia (23-5) vs. 13) Iona (19-8)
5) Louisville (23-4) vs. 12) Middle Tennessee (19-7)
@Buffalo
3) Michigan St (22-6) vs. 14) Boston (20-9)
6) UCLA (21-6) vs. 11) St John's (18-10)/Missouri (19-8)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (21-6) vs. 15) Stephen F Austin (23-2)
7) New Mexico (21-5) vs. 10) St Joseph's (19-7)
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (25-2) vs. 16) Robert Morris (18-11)/VMI (13-10)
8) SMU (22-6) vs. 9) Arizona St (19-8)
@Spokane
4) Iowa St (21-5) vs. 13) Belmont (20-8)
5) Ohio St (22-6) vs. 12) North Dakota St (18-6)
@San Antonio
3) St Louis (24-2) vs. 14) Harvard (21-4)
6) Iowa (19-7) vs. 11) Georgetown (16-11)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (22-6) vs. 15) North Carolina Central (19-5)
7) UConn (21-6) vs. 10) Baylor (16-9)
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (25-2) vs. 16) Vermont (17-9)
8) VCU (20-7) vs. 9) California (18-9)
@Orlando
4) Michigan (19-7) vs. 13) Mercer (19-7)
5) Kentucky (21-6) vs. 12) Xavier (18-9)
@Raleigh
3) Villanova (24-3) vs. 14) Delaware (20-9)
6) Memphis (20-6) vs. 11) Green Bay (19-5)
@Milwaukee
2) Creighton (23-4) vs. 15) Georgia St (18-7)
7) Texas (20-7) vs. 10) Pittsburgh (20-7)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (25-2) vs. 16) Davidson (16-11)
8) Kansas St (18-9) vs. 9) Gonzaga (22-6)
@San Diego
4) Cincinnati (24-4) vs. 13) New Mexico St (20-8)
5) North Carolina (20-7) vs. 12) Minnesota (16-10)/Oregon (18-8)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (22-5) vs. 14) Western Michigan (17-8)
6) UMass (21-5) vs. 11) BYU (19-10)
@San Antonio
2) San Diego St (21-3) vs. 15) UC Santa Barbara (16-7)
7) Oklahoma (20-7) vs. 10) Stanford (18-8)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (28-0) vs. 16) Weber St (13-9)/Alabama St (12-9)
8) Colorado (20-8) vs. 9) George Washington (20-7)
@Spokane
4) Virginia (23-5) vs. 13) Iona (19-8)
5) Louisville (23-4) vs. 12) Middle Tennessee (19-7)
@Buffalo
3) Michigan St (22-6) vs. 14) Boston (20-9)
6) UCLA (21-6) vs. 11) St John's (18-10)/Missouri (19-8)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (21-6) vs. 15) Stephen F Austin (23-2)
7) New Mexico (21-5) vs. 10) St Joseph's (19-7)
Sunday, February 23, 2014
2/24 NIT/CBI/CIT projections
As usual, your weekly minor tournament projections.
NIT: Remember, I am assuming massive amounts of incompetency in the NIT selection committee on these. Toledo is much better than a 5, USM is better than a 5, Indiana St a 6, you get the idea. However, the significant power conference bias will lead them to get all of the home games. Based on merit, both of those Pac-12 games in the west should be road games for Washington and Utah; but we know the NIT committee will screw that up.
1) Providence (18-10) vs. 8) Quinnipiac (19-8)
4) Ole Miss (16-11) vs. 5) Southern Miss (21-5)
3) West Virginia (15-12) vs. 6) Indiana St (19-7)
2) Florida St (16-11) vs. 7) Vanderbilt (15-11)
1) Oklahoma St (17-10) vs. 8) Texas A&M (16-11)
4) Clemson (17-9) vs. 5) Louisiana Tech (21-6)
3) Richmond (18-9) vs. 6) Georgia (15-11)
2) Arkansas (18-9) vs. 7) San Francisco (16-10)
1) Tennessee (15-11) vs. 8) Ohio (18-8)
4) Maryland (15-12) vs. 5) Toledo (22-4)
3) Marquette (16-11) vs. 6) Indiana (15-11)
2) Dayton (19-8) vs. 7) NC State (17-10)
1) Nebraska (16-10) vs. 8) Wyoming (15-10)
4) Washington (15-13) vs. 5) St Mary's (19-9)
3) Utah (16-9) vs. 6) Boise St (16-9)
2) LSU (16-10) vs. 7) UNLV (17-10)
CBI: Right now we have an abundance of .500 teams available, so I'm not projecting them to take any under .500 team. Again, these projections assume that everyone that is eligible would accept a bid. In reality, many of these teams would reject bids, but since we don't know who will and who won't yet, I project them all in.
IPFW (17-9) at Purdue (15-12)
Cleveland St (17-10) at Missouri St (17-10)
Pepperdine (14-13) at Oregon St (14-12)
Colorado St (13-13) at UTEP (18-8)
Manhattan (20-7) at Seton Hall (14-13)
Buffalo (15-8) at St Bonaventure (16-11)
Towson (19-9) at Western Kentucky (17-9)
FGCU (17-10) at Miami (14-13)
CIT: Same deal as the CBI. I have no idea which of these teams would accept a bid and who wouldn't. Some of the bigger schools in here would reject a bid for being above this tournament; some of the lesser schools might save money and not play. These projections are more intended to give everyone an idea of the caliber of team likely to play in this tournament.
Bryant (16-11) at Holy Cross (17-11)
Yale (13-10) at Canisius (19-9)
American (16-11) at William & Mary (16-10)
Drexel (15-12) at Stony Brook (19-8)
La-Lafayette (15-10) at Sam Houston St (17-7)
Arkansas St (15-9) at Tulsa (15-12)
Eastern Michigan (12-12) at Illinois St (14-13)
Morehead St (17-10) at Valparaiso (14-12)
Coastal Carolina (13-12) at Elon (15-10)
Hampton (15-11) at Charlotte (14-12)
Eastern Kentucky (17-9) at Akron (17-10)
UAB (15-10) at Murray St (15-9)
South Dakota St (13-11) at Portland (15-13)
Utah St (14-12) at Utah Valley (14-10)
San Diego (14-14) at UC Irvine (16-10)
Denver (14-12) at Northern Colorado (14-9)
NIT: Remember, I am assuming massive amounts of incompetency in the NIT selection committee on these. Toledo is much better than a 5, USM is better than a 5, Indiana St a 6, you get the idea. However, the significant power conference bias will lead them to get all of the home games. Based on merit, both of those Pac-12 games in the west should be road games for Washington and Utah; but we know the NIT committee will screw that up.
1) Providence (18-10) vs. 8) Quinnipiac (19-8)
4) Ole Miss (16-11) vs. 5) Southern Miss (21-5)
3) West Virginia (15-12) vs. 6) Indiana St (19-7)
2) Florida St (16-11) vs. 7) Vanderbilt (15-11)
1) Oklahoma St (17-10) vs. 8) Texas A&M (16-11)
4) Clemson (17-9) vs. 5) Louisiana Tech (21-6)
3) Richmond (18-9) vs. 6) Georgia (15-11)
2) Arkansas (18-9) vs. 7) San Francisco (16-10)
1) Tennessee (15-11) vs. 8) Ohio (18-8)
4) Maryland (15-12) vs. 5) Toledo (22-4)
3) Marquette (16-11) vs. 6) Indiana (15-11)
2) Dayton (19-8) vs. 7) NC State (17-10)
1) Nebraska (16-10) vs. 8) Wyoming (15-10)
4) Washington (15-13) vs. 5) St Mary's (19-9)
3) Utah (16-9) vs. 6) Boise St (16-9)
2) LSU (16-10) vs. 7) UNLV (17-10)
CBI: Right now we have an abundance of .500 teams available, so I'm not projecting them to take any under .500 team. Again, these projections assume that everyone that is eligible would accept a bid. In reality, many of these teams would reject bids, but since we don't know who will and who won't yet, I project them all in.
IPFW (17-9) at Purdue (15-12)
Cleveland St (17-10) at Missouri St (17-10)
Pepperdine (14-13) at Oregon St (14-12)
Colorado St (13-13) at UTEP (18-8)
Manhattan (20-7) at Seton Hall (14-13)
Buffalo (15-8) at St Bonaventure (16-11)
Towson (19-9) at Western Kentucky (17-9)
FGCU (17-10) at Miami (14-13)
CIT: Same deal as the CBI. I have no idea which of these teams would accept a bid and who wouldn't. Some of the bigger schools in here would reject a bid for being above this tournament; some of the lesser schools might save money and not play. These projections are more intended to give everyone an idea of the caliber of team likely to play in this tournament.
Bryant (16-11) at Holy Cross (17-11)
Yale (13-10) at Canisius (19-9)
American (16-11) at William & Mary (16-10)
Drexel (15-12) at Stony Brook (19-8)
La-Lafayette (15-10) at Sam Houston St (17-7)
Arkansas St (15-9) at Tulsa (15-12)
Eastern Michigan (12-12) at Illinois St (14-13)
Morehead St (17-10) at Valparaiso (14-12)
Coastal Carolina (13-12) at Elon (15-10)
Hampton (15-11) at Charlotte (14-12)
Eastern Kentucky (17-9) at Akron (17-10)
UAB (15-10) at Murray St (15-9)
South Dakota St (13-11) at Portland (15-13)
Utah St (14-12) at Utah Valley (14-10)
San Diego (14-14) at UC Irvine (16-10)
Denver (14-12) at Northern Colorado (14-9)
2/23 recap
Michigan 79, Michigan St 70 - MSU probably back to the 3 or 4 line, just a couple too many losses; Michigan is a tough read, right around 3/4 too
Nebraska 76, Purdue 57
Utah 86, Arizona St 63 - curious blowout; just when ASU had traction, they gave it back
California 77, USC 64
Oregon 67, Washington St 53
Florida St 71, Pittsburgh 66 - say what? good road win for FSU and they're not deceased. Pitt is on the bubble now, though
Creighton 72, Seton Hall 71
Providence 87, Butler 81
SMU 64, UConn 55 - signature road win for SMU; nearing lockbox status
Bucknell 63, Boston 53 - surprising home loss, Patriot still in play
Columbia 62, Yale 46 - marginal home loss, now 1 back in the Ivy
FGCU and Mercer win in the A-Sun, Iona wins in the MAAC, Vermont wins in the A-East, Toledo wins in the MAC
Delaware loses at home to Drexel
Monday
Syracuse at Maryland - can't bleed any more losses to maintain the 1 line
Oklahoma at Kansas
and a bunch of small school stuff
Nebraska 76, Purdue 57
Utah 86, Arizona St 63 - curious blowout; just when ASU had traction, they gave it back
California 77, USC 64
Oregon 67, Washington St 53
Florida St 71, Pittsburgh 66 - say what? good road win for FSU and they're not deceased. Pitt is on the bubble now, though
Creighton 72, Seton Hall 71
Providence 87, Butler 81
SMU 64, UConn 55 - signature road win for SMU; nearing lockbox status
Bucknell 63, Boston 53 - surprising home loss, Patriot still in play
Columbia 62, Yale 46 - marginal home loss, now 1 back in the Ivy
FGCU and Mercer win in the A-Sun, Iona wins in the MAAC, Vermont wins in the A-East, Toledo wins in the MAC
Delaware loses at home to Drexel
Monday
Syracuse at Maryland - can't bleed any more losses to maintain the 1 line
Oklahoma at Kansas
and a bunch of small school stuff
Conference races
Let's check in on the 32 conference races one last time. Consider this your checklist and status update on everyone before we reach March.
America East:
Vermont 13-1
Stony Brook 12-2
Stony Brook visits Vermont on the 27th, and the #1 seed in this conference tournament means everything.
American:
Cincinnati 13-2
Louisville 12-2
They are 2 ahead of SMU and Memphis in the loss column. UConn is 3 back in 5th.
A-10:
St Louis 12-0
St Joseph's 9-3
several at 8-4
With just 4 games left, St Louis should have this one in hand. St Joe's leading the race for 2nd could be huge.
ACC:
Virginia 14-1
Syracuse 12-2
Syracuse visits Virginia on March 1. Duke and UNC have 4 losses and are too far back, realistically.
A-Sun:
Mercer 13-3
FGCU 13-3
Two to play; they split the season series.
Big 12:
Kansas 12-2
Iowa St 9-5
Oklahoma 9-5
Texas 9-5
3 up with 4 to play.
Big East:
Creighton 12-2
Villanova 12-2
Creighton has the season sweep, so they're in the driver's seat.
Big Sky:
Weber St 12-4
Northern Colorado 10-6
4 to play here. They split the season series.
Big South:
VMI 10-4
High Point 10-4
Coastal Carolina 9-5
Gardner-Webb 9-5
UNC-Asheville 9-5
2 to play. VMI and High Point play Wednesday, which knocks the 8-6s out of contention. Both have non-contenders for their final game so VMI/HP might be for the conference (and for a NIT bid).
Big 10:
Michigan 11-3
Michigan St 11-4
Wisconsin 9-5
Iowa 8-5
A lot can still happen here.
Big West:
UCSB 9-3
UC Irvine 9-3
Long Beach St 8-4
Everyone's got 4 to play. UCSB and UCI play on the 27th, and will give clarity.
Colonial
Delaware 12-2
Towson 11-3
2 to play; they split the season series.
CUSA:
MTSU 11-2
Southern Miss 10-3
Louisiana Tech 10-3
UTEP 10-3
Tulsa 10-3
3 to play for everyone. MTSU at LT and UTEP at Tulsa on the 27th, last meetings between contenders.
Horizon:
Green Bay 12-2
They've got the 1 seed, Cleveland St can catch them, but lose the tiebreaker
Ivy:
Harvard 9-1
Yale 8-2
They play late in the season.
MAAC:
Iona 16-2
Quinnipiac 14-4
The magic number for Iona is 1.
MAC:
Western Michigan 11-3
Toledo 10-3
Buffalo is 10-4 in the East division, WMU and Toledo in the west.
MEAC:
NCCU 12-1
Hampton 10-3
Norfolk St and Morgan St also on 9-3; NCCU visits Norfolk St later in the season.
MVC:
Wichita St 16-0
This one was dead awhile ago.
Mountain West:
San Diego St 12-2
New Mexico 12-2
They play again, in San Diego, likely for the conference.
Northeast:
Robert Morris 13-1
RMU won this yesterday.
OVC:
Belmont 12-2
Murray St 12-2
They're both going to win their divisions of the OVC.
Pac-12:
Arizona 12-2
UCLA 10-4
2 up with 4 to play.
Patriot:
Boston 13-3
American 12-4
Holy Cross 11-5
2 to play. Boston still has to play at Holy Cross.
SEC:
Florida 14-0
Kentucky 11-3
3 up with 4 to play.
SoCon:
Davidson 13-1
Elon 10-3
Elon won at Davidson, and get them again, so it's not over yet...but it's about to be.
Southland:
Stephen F Austin 14-0
Sam Houston St 11-3
4 to play, tough to imagine SFA losing anytime soon though.
SWAC:
Southern 12-2
Alabama St 9-4
Southern will be forfeiting their NIT bid.
Summit:
North Dakota St 10-2
IPFW 8-4
South Dakota St 8-4
Denver 8-4
2 up with 2 to play; it's likely over.
Sun Belt:
Georgia St 13-1
Western Kentucky 10-4
4 to play, so it's not quite over yet.
WCC:
Gonzaga 13-3
BYU 12-5
San Francisco 11-5
Gonzaga should still be safe.
WAC:
New Mexico St 10-3
Utah Valley 10-3
Grand Canyon 8-4
NMSU and UVU play on the 27th.
America East:
Vermont 13-1
Stony Brook 12-2
Stony Brook visits Vermont on the 27th, and the #1 seed in this conference tournament means everything.
American:
Cincinnati 13-2
Louisville 12-2
They are 2 ahead of SMU and Memphis in the loss column. UConn is 3 back in 5th.
A-10:
St Louis 12-0
St Joseph's 9-3
several at 8-4
With just 4 games left, St Louis should have this one in hand. St Joe's leading the race for 2nd could be huge.
ACC:
Virginia 14-1
Syracuse 12-2
Syracuse visits Virginia on March 1. Duke and UNC have 4 losses and are too far back, realistically.
A-Sun:
Mercer 13-3
FGCU 13-3
Two to play; they split the season series.
Big 12:
Kansas 12-2
Iowa St 9-5
Oklahoma 9-5
Texas 9-5
3 up with 4 to play.
Big East:
Creighton 12-2
Villanova 12-2
Creighton has the season sweep, so they're in the driver's seat.
Big Sky:
Weber St 12-4
Northern Colorado 10-6
4 to play here. They split the season series.
Big South:
VMI 10-4
High Point 10-4
Coastal Carolina 9-5
Gardner-Webb 9-5
UNC-Asheville 9-5
2 to play. VMI and High Point play Wednesday, which knocks the 8-6s out of contention. Both have non-contenders for their final game so VMI/HP might be for the conference (and for a NIT bid).
Big 10:
Michigan 11-3
Michigan St 11-4
Wisconsin 9-5
Iowa 8-5
A lot can still happen here.
Big West:
UCSB 9-3
UC Irvine 9-3
Long Beach St 8-4
Everyone's got 4 to play. UCSB and UCI play on the 27th, and will give clarity.
Colonial
Delaware 12-2
Towson 11-3
2 to play; they split the season series.
CUSA:
MTSU 11-2
Southern Miss 10-3
Louisiana Tech 10-3
UTEP 10-3
Tulsa 10-3
3 to play for everyone. MTSU at LT and UTEP at Tulsa on the 27th, last meetings between contenders.
Horizon:
Green Bay 12-2
They've got the 1 seed, Cleveland St can catch them, but lose the tiebreaker
Ivy:
Harvard 9-1
Yale 8-2
They play late in the season.
MAAC:
Iona 16-2
Quinnipiac 14-4
The magic number for Iona is 1.
MAC:
Western Michigan 11-3
Toledo 10-3
Buffalo is 10-4 in the East division, WMU and Toledo in the west.
MEAC:
NCCU 12-1
Hampton 10-3
Norfolk St and Morgan St also on 9-3; NCCU visits Norfolk St later in the season.
MVC:
Wichita St 16-0
This one was dead awhile ago.
Mountain West:
San Diego St 12-2
New Mexico 12-2
They play again, in San Diego, likely for the conference.
Northeast:
Robert Morris 13-1
RMU won this yesterday.
OVC:
Belmont 12-2
Murray St 12-2
They're both going to win their divisions of the OVC.
Pac-12:
Arizona 12-2
UCLA 10-4
2 up with 4 to play.
Patriot:
Boston 13-3
American 12-4
Holy Cross 11-5
2 to play. Boston still has to play at Holy Cross.
SEC:
Florida 14-0
Kentucky 11-3
3 up with 4 to play.
SoCon:
Davidson 13-1
Elon 10-3
Elon won at Davidson, and get them again, so it's not over yet...but it's about to be.
Southland:
Stephen F Austin 14-0
Sam Houston St 11-3
4 to play, tough to imagine SFA losing anytime soon though.
SWAC:
Southern 12-2
Alabama St 9-4
Southern will be forfeiting their NIT bid.
Summit:
North Dakota St 10-2
IPFW 8-4
South Dakota St 8-4
Denver 8-4
2 up with 2 to play; it's likely over.
Sun Belt:
Georgia St 13-1
Western Kentucky 10-4
4 to play, so it's not quite over yet.
WCC:
Gonzaga 13-3
BYU 12-5
San Francisco 11-5
Gonzaga should still be safe.
WAC:
New Mexico St 10-3
Utah Valley 10-3
Grand Canyon 8-4
NMSU and UVU play on the 27th.
Saturday, February 22, 2014
2/22 recap
Wisconsin 79, Iowa 74 - Wisky has a shot at the 1 line, folks. Recognize. As for Iowa, their grip on the top 4 lines is very tenuous and probably gone for now.
Ohio St 64, Minnesota 46 - No harm to Minny for this one, the damage was against Illinois earlier this week.
Indiana 61, Northwestern 56
Kansas 85, Texas 54 - This is the type of statement that gets you a 1 seed in March. Texas has lost its grip on a protected seed for good, it seems.
Oklahoma 86, Kansas St 73 - Is KSU in any trouble? Not yet. But they might want to win a swing game or two just in case.
Oklahoma St 84, Texas Tech 62 - They may still fall out of my bracket.
Baylor 88, West Virginia 75 - Quality road win; we're about done with WVU here; Baylor very viable the closer they are to .500 in the Big 12
Iowa St 71, TCU 60
Duke 66, Syracuse 60 - Duke on the 2 line for now. Syracuse on the 1 line for now. This game changes their margin of errors, not their actual seeds.
North Carolina 105, Wake Forest 72
Clemson 63, Georgia Tech 55 - Every road win matters now.
Virginia 70, Notre Dame 49
NC State 71, Virginia Tech 64
Arizona 88, Colorado 61 - Statement win to help alleviate the 1 seed pressure.
Stanford 83, UCLA 74 - Key home win for Stanford; they're trending safer now.
Washington 86, Oregon St 62 - NIT bubble game, if that's your cup of tea.
Florida 75, Ole Miss 71 - Bye, Ole Miss. Welcome to the #1 overall seed, Florida.
Kentucky 77, LSU 76 (OT) - So close to a signature win that would've saved the at-large profile. As is, they're still too adrift to matter. Kentucky just isn't going to be a protected seed without beating Florida at least once.
Texas A&M 68, Tennessee 65 (OT) - You know, UT, at some point, too many losses are too many losses. Stop losing.
Alabama 80, Missouri 73 - Oh for fuck's sake, SEC.
Arkansas 73, Mississippi St 69 - Road win! Breaking news!
Vanderbilt 67, Auburn 59 - No bubble impact, but want to point out the following teams are on 7-7 in the SEC: A&M, Tenn, Mizzou, Vandy, Arky, LSU, Ole Miss. What a mess.
Georgia 73, South Carolina 56 - No bracket impact, but do you realize they're 3rd in the SEC by 2 games? The NIT might listen to them.
Villanova 57, St John's 54 - Golden chance goes by the boards for the Johnnies. But, this result doesn't hurt them either.
Marquette 96, DePaul 94 (OT) - MU actually in the middle of the 3rd place race in the BEast; they could muck things up for everyone else.
Louisville 58, Cincinnati 57 - Signature road win, and a very critical part of the resume. Louisville's resume holes were problems of quality; and this masks that problem. This win is likely worth 2 seeding lines to me.
Memphis 82, Temple 79 (OT)
St Louis 66, George Washington 59 - StL is a legit 3 seed, right now. GWU? I guess they have to be on the bubble now, but in reality, they're safe.
Dayton 57, Duquesne 54
St Joseph's 87, Fordham 72
Richmond 62, LaSalle 49 - A-10 bubble teams quietly taking care of business.
New Mexico 58, San Diego St 44 - Lockbox!
Colorado St 82, Wyoming 67 - For anyone who thought Wyoming could backdoor into the conversation...no.
Boise St 91, UNLV 90 (OT) - NIT implications.
Wichita St 83, Drake 54
Missouri St 77, Indiana St 66 - Probably endgame for ISU.
San Diego 69, Gonzaga 66 - Get on the bubble where you belong, Zags.
BYU 89, Portland 72
San Francisco 64, Pacific 59
St Mary's 76, Santa Clara 54
Southern Miss 77, UTEP 68 - I suppose it's good for USM, but they're too adrift.
small school:
NDSU beats SDSU and figures to have the Summit on ice
MTSU, Tulsa, and LaTech win in CUSA, crowded at the top
Robert Morris to 13-1 in the NEC
Ohio beats Akron on the road (hey, NIT implications!)
NCCU goes to 12-1 in the MEAC
Stephen F Austin to 14-0 in the Southland
Davidson to 13-1 in the SoCon
New Mexico St has drawn even with Utah Valley after the latter lost at UMKC
Harvard sneaks a half-game ahead of Yale in the Ivy
Georgia St to 13-1 in the Sun Belt
Sunday funday:
Michigan St at Michigan
SMU at UConn - a chance to lockbox for SMU
Florida St at Pittsburgh - Pitt just needs to avoid bad losses
Arizona St at Utah, USC at Cal, Washington St at Oregon - Pac-12 hold-serve games
Ohio St 64, Minnesota 46 - No harm to Minny for this one, the damage was against Illinois earlier this week.
Indiana 61, Northwestern 56
Kansas 85, Texas 54 - This is the type of statement that gets you a 1 seed in March. Texas has lost its grip on a protected seed for good, it seems.
Oklahoma 86, Kansas St 73 - Is KSU in any trouble? Not yet. But they might want to win a swing game or two just in case.
Oklahoma St 84, Texas Tech 62 - They may still fall out of my bracket.
Baylor 88, West Virginia 75 - Quality road win; we're about done with WVU here; Baylor very viable the closer they are to .500 in the Big 12
Iowa St 71, TCU 60
Duke 66, Syracuse 60 - Duke on the 2 line for now. Syracuse on the 1 line for now. This game changes their margin of errors, not their actual seeds.
North Carolina 105, Wake Forest 72
Clemson 63, Georgia Tech 55 - Every road win matters now.
Virginia 70, Notre Dame 49
NC State 71, Virginia Tech 64
Arizona 88, Colorado 61 - Statement win to help alleviate the 1 seed pressure.
Stanford 83, UCLA 74 - Key home win for Stanford; they're trending safer now.
Washington 86, Oregon St 62 - NIT bubble game, if that's your cup of tea.
Florida 75, Ole Miss 71 - Bye, Ole Miss. Welcome to the #1 overall seed, Florida.
Kentucky 77, LSU 76 (OT) - So close to a signature win that would've saved the at-large profile. As is, they're still too adrift to matter. Kentucky just isn't going to be a protected seed without beating Florida at least once.
Texas A&M 68, Tennessee 65 (OT) - You know, UT, at some point, too many losses are too many losses. Stop losing.
Alabama 80, Missouri 73 - Oh for fuck's sake, SEC.
Arkansas 73, Mississippi St 69 - Road win! Breaking news!
Vanderbilt 67, Auburn 59 - No bubble impact, but want to point out the following teams are on 7-7 in the SEC: A&M, Tenn, Mizzou, Vandy, Arky, LSU, Ole Miss. What a mess.
Georgia 73, South Carolina 56 - No bracket impact, but do you realize they're 3rd in the SEC by 2 games? The NIT might listen to them.
Villanova 57, St John's 54 - Golden chance goes by the boards for the Johnnies. But, this result doesn't hurt them either.
Marquette 96, DePaul 94 (OT) - MU actually in the middle of the 3rd place race in the BEast; they could muck things up for everyone else.
Louisville 58, Cincinnati 57 - Signature road win, and a very critical part of the resume. Louisville's resume holes were problems of quality; and this masks that problem. This win is likely worth 2 seeding lines to me.
Memphis 82, Temple 79 (OT)
St Louis 66, George Washington 59 - StL is a legit 3 seed, right now. GWU? I guess they have to be on the bubble now, but in reality, they're safe.
Dayton 57, Duquesne 54
St Joseph's 87, Fordham 72
Richmond 62, LaSalle 49 - A-10 bubble teams quietly taking care of business.
New Mexico 58, San Diego St 44 - Lockbox!
Colorado St 82, Wyoming 67 - For anyone who thought Wyoming could backdoor into the conversation...no.
Boise St 91, UNLV 90 (OT) - NIT implications.
Wichita St 83, Drake 54
Missouri St 77, Indiana St 66 - Probably endgame for ISU.
San Diego 69, Gonzaga 66 - Get on the bubble where you belong, Zags.
BYU 89, Portland 72
San Francisco 64, Pacific 59
St Mary's 76, Santa Clara 54
Southern Miss 77, UTEP 68 - I suppose it's good for USM, but they're too adrift.
small school:
NDSU beats SDSU and figures to have the Summit on ice
MTSU, Tulsa, and LaTech win in CUSA, crowded at the top
Robert Morris to 13-1 in the NEC
Ohio beats Akron on the road (hey, NIT implications!)
NCCU goes to 12-1 in the MEAC
Stephen F Austin to 14-0 in the Southland
Davidson to 13-1 in the SoCon
New Mexico St has drawn even with Utah Valley after the latter lost at UMKC
Harvard sneaks a half-game ahead of Yale in the Ivy
Georgia St to 13-1 in the Sun Belt
Sunday funday:
Michigan St at Michigan
SMU at UConn - a chance to lockbox for SMU
Florida St at Pittsburgh - Pitt just needs to avoid bad losses
Arizona St at Utah, USC at Cal, Washington St at Oregon - Pac-12 hold-serve games
S-Curve 2/21
1) Bubble thoughts: when I got to the last 3 at-large spots, I threw up. I don't feel good about any of those 3. I can't imagine Okla St making the tournament in their current form. I gave serious considerations to the next 4 teams for those 3 spots. 7 playing 4 spots right now on my cutline.
2) The one line is tricky. I'm invoking the eye test - Syracuse and Arizona just don't look that good right now. The good news though is that they have chances for quality wins, so the eye test won't matter in a few days. Wichita to #2 for now.
3) Just mild shuffling in the top half of my bracket. Virginia at a 5 is the one seed up there I don't like - feels like it should be a 4, but I can't figure out who to take down (maybe Iowa)
4) If you notice, SDSU has leapt Kansas on the S-Curve - this is cosmetic. With the Duke loss, I moved SDSU up to 6, right behind Kansas at 5...and they have a head-to-head result I'm going to choose to respect. Not sure if the committee would do the same.
5) I still list VCU and New Mexico on the bubble, but they're each about to be a lock, win or lose.
6) UNC jumps to the 5 line. They have signature wins and are not dropping bad games anymore. I think the committee is going to go bananas over this profile.
7) Later today, I'll bracket this up.
The 1 line: Florida (24-2), Wichita St (27-0), Syracuse (25-1), Arizona (24-2)
The 2 line: San Diego St (21-2), Kansas (20-6), Duke (21-6), Michigan St (22-5)
The 3 line: Villanova (23-3), Cincinnati (24-3), Creighton (22-4), Wisconsin (21-5)
The 4 line: Iowa St (20-5), St Louis (23-2), Iowa (19-6), Michigan (18-7)
The 5 line: Virginia (22-5), North Carolina (19-7), Kentucky (20-6), Ohio St (21-6)
The 6 line: Texas (20-6), UCLA (21-5), UConn (21-5), Memphis (19-6)
The 7 line: UMass (20-5), Louisville (22-4), Oklahoma (19-7), Kansas St (18-8)
The 8 line: VCU (20-6), New Mexico (20-5), Pittsburgh (20-6), Colorado (20-7)
The 9 line: Arizona St (19-7), Gonzaga (22-5), G Washington (20-6), SMU (21-6)
The 10 line: California (17-9), Minnesota (16-10), Stanford (17-8), Missouri (19-7)
The 11 line: BYU (18-10), Xavier (17-8), St Joseph's (18-7), Tennessee (15-10), St John's (18-9)
The 12 line: Baylor (15-9), Oklahoma St (16-10), Green Bay (19-5), North Dakota St (17-6), UTEP (18-7)
The 13 line: Mercer (18-6), Belmont (20-8), Delaware (20-8), Iona (17-8)
The 14 line: Boston (20-8), Stephen F Austin (20-2), North Carolina Central (18-5), Western Michigan (16-8)
The 15 line: Georgia St (17-7), UC Irvine (16-9), Davidson (15-11), Vermont (16-9)
The 16 line: Robert Morris (17-11), Weber St (12-9), Yale (12-9), Utah Valley (14-9), Alabama St (11-9), High Point (11-13)
Bubble in: VCU, New Mexico, Pittsburgh, Colorado, Arizona St, *Gonzaga, G Washington, SMU, California, Minnesota, Stanford
Next 4 in:
Missouri
BYU
Xavier
St Joseph's
Last 4 in:
Tennessee
St John's
Baylor
Oklahoma St
Last 4 out:
Georgetown (15-11)
Richmond (17-9)
Providence (17-10)
Oregon (17-8)
Next 4 out:
Indiana St (18-6)
Arkansas (17-9)
LSU (16-9)
Dayton (18-8)
Bubble inception: WE NEED TO GO DEEPER
Florida St (15-11)
Nebraska (15-10)
West Virginia (15-11)
Clemson (16-9)
Ole Miss (16-10)
Southern Miss (20-5)
Toledo (21-4)
Just off the consideration board: Marquette, Maryland, St Mary's, Boise St, Wyoming, Louisiana Tech, Harvard
2) The one line is tricky. I'm invoking the eye test - Syracuse and Arizona just don't look that good right now. The good news though is that they have chances for quality wins, so the eye test won't matter in a few days. Wichita to #2 for now.
3) Just mild shuffling in the top half of my bracket. Virginia at a 5 is the one seed up there I don't like - feels like it should be a 4, but I can't figure out who to take down (maybe Iowa)
4) If you notice, SDSU has leapt Kansas on the S-Curve - this is cosmetic. With the Duke loss, I moved SDSU up to 6, right behind Kansas at 5...and they have a head-to-head result I'm going to choose to respect. Not sure if the committee would do the same.
5) I still list VCU and New Mexico on the bubble, but they're each about to be a lock, win or lose.
6) UNC jumps to the 5 line. They have signature wins and are not dropping bad games anymore. I think the committee is going to go bananas over this profile.
7) Later today, I'll bracket this up.
The 1 line: Florida (24-2), Wichita St (27-0), Syracuse (25-1), Arizona (24-2)
The 2 line: San Diego St (21-2), Kansas (20-6), Duke (21-6), Michigan St (22-5)
The 3 line: Villanova (23-3), Cincinnati (24-3), Creighton (22-4), Wisconsin (21-5)
The 4 line: Iowa St (20-5), St Louis (23-2), Iowa (19-6), Michigan (18-7)
The 5 line: Virginia (22-5), North Carolina (19-7), Kentucky (20-6), Ohio St (21-6)
The 6 line: Texas (20-6), UCLA (21-5), UConn (21-5), Memphis (19-6)
The 7 line: UMass (20-5), Louisville (22-4), Oklahoma (19-7), Kansas St (18-8)
The 8 line: VCU (20-6), New Mexico (20-5), Pittsburgh (20-6), Colorado (20-7)
The 9 line: Arizona St (19-7), Gonzaga (22-5), G Washington (20-6), SMU (21-6)
The 10 line: California (17-9), Minnesota (16-10), Stanford (17-8), Missouri (19-7)
The 11 line: BYU (18-10), Xavier (17-8), St Joseph's (18-7), Tennessee (15-10), St John's (18-9)
The 12 line: Baylor (15-9), Oklahoma St (16-10), Green Bay (19-5), North Dakota St (17-6), UTEP (18-7)
The 13 line: Mercer (18-6), Belmont (20-8), Delaware (20-8), Iona (17-8)
The 14 line: Boston (20-8), Stephen F Austin (20-2), North Carolina Central (18-5), Western Michigan (16-8)
The 15 line: Georgia St (17-7), UC Irvine (16-9), Davidson (15-11), Vermont (16-9)
The 16 line: Robert Morris (17-11), Weber St (12-9), Yale (12-9), Utah Valley (14-9), Alabama St (11-9), High Point (11-13)
Bubble in: VCU, New Mexico, Pittsburgh, Colorado, Arizona St, *Gonzaga, G Washington, SMU, California, Minnesota, Stanford
Next 4 in:
Missouri
BYU
Xavier
St Joseph's
Last 4 in:
Tennessee
St John's
Baylor
Oklahoma St
Last 4 out:
Georgetown (15-11)
Richmond (17-9)
Providence (17-10)
Oregon (17-8)
Next 4 out:
Indiana St (18-6)
Arkansas (17-9)
LSU (16-9)
Dayton (18-8)
Bubble inception: WE NEED TO GO DEEPER
Florida St (15-11)
Nebraska (15-10)
West Virginia (15-11)
Clemson (16-9)
Ole Miss (16-10)
Southern Miss (20-5)
Toledo (21-4)
Just off the consideration board: Marquette, Maryland, St Mary's, Boise St, Wyoming, Louisiana Tech, Harvard
Friday, February 21, 2014
2/21 recap
UMass 80, VCU 75 - UMass is just about locked up; no harm no foul for VCU, but this could've been worth a seed line
FGCU 75, Mercer 61 - tied at 12-3, split season series, 3 to play in the A-Sun
Iona 80, Rider 77 - 15-2 in the MAAC; elsewhere, Manhattan absorbed a road loss to fall 3 back
Yale and Harvard both win on the road in the Ivy
Quality Saturday emerging:
Xavier at Georgetown - X can't afford too many more losses before being on the wrong side of the bubble; Georgetown is on the brink of losing the bubble altogether
Florida at Ole Miss - Ole Miss already lost their last chance saloon chance vs. Kentucky; Florida has margin of error now as far as a 1 seed goes
Louisville at Cincinnati - detailed already about Louisville's problem resume; they need a signature win desperately
Wisconsin at Iowa - a 1 seed still in play for Wisky; Iowa has a small margin of error to maintain a top 4 seed
St John's at Villanova - a free shot for the Johnnies, really
Baylor at West Virginia - high-impact bubble game
Texas Tech at Oklahoma St - such a must-win for OSU
South Dakota St at North Dakota St -this is for the Summit lead
LSU at Kentucky - LSU can rescue their entire profile right here
Kansas St at Oklahoma - high impact game for the S-Curve
UCLA at Stanford - Stanford is starting to fall behind the other Pac-12 bubble teams
Minnesota at Ohio St - all of a sudden, Minny could use a quality win to balance out Illinois
UTEP at Southern Miss - winner gets to cling onto the bubble
Syracuse at Duke - implications on the top line
Texas at Kansas - more top line implications
George Washington at St Louis - another chance for GWU to lock themselves up; St Louis can start thinking about a VERY high seed
Arizona at Colorado - a chance for Colorado to just about lockbox; Arizona needs to stop the bleeding and pass the 1 seed eye test again
San Diego St at New Mexico - here's the game SDSU needs to prove it deserves that 2 seed; New Mexico non the brink of the lockbox themselves
FGCU 75, Mercer 61 - tied at 12-3, split season series, 3 to play in the A-Sun
Iona 80, Rider 77 - 15-2 in the MAAC; elsewhere, Manhattan absorbed a road loss to fall 3 back
Yale and Harvard both win on the road in the Ivy
Quality Saturday emerging:
Xavier at Georgetown - X can't afford too many more losses before being on the wrong side of the bubble; Georgetown is on the brink of losing the bubble altogether
Florida at Ole Miss - Ole Miss already lost their last chance saloon chance vs. Kentucky; Florida has margin of error now as far as a 1 seed goes
Louisville at Cincinnati - detailed already about Louisville's problem resume; they need a signature win desperately
Wisconsin at Iowa - a 1 seed still in play for Wisky; Iowa has a small margin of error to maintain a top 4 seed
St John's at Villanova - a free shot for the Johnnies, really
Baylor at West Virginia - high-impact bubble game
Texas Tech at Oklahoma St - such a must-win for OSU
South Dakota St at North Dakota St -this is for the Summit lead
LSU at Kentucky - LSU can rescue their entire profile right here
Kansas St at Oklahoma - high impact game for the S-Curve
UCLA at Stanford - Stanford is starting to fall behind the other Pac-12 bubble teams
Minnesota at Ohio St - all of a sudden, Minny could use a quality win to balance out Illinois
UTEP at Southern Miss - winner gets to cling onto the bubble
Syracuse at Duke - implications on the top line
Texas at Kansas - more top line implications
George Washington at St Louis - another chance for GWU to lock themselves up; St Louis can start thinking about a VERY high seed
Arizona at Colorado - a chance for Colorado to just about lockbox; Arizona needs to stop the bleeding and pass the 1 seed eye test again
San Diego St at New Mexico - here's the game SDSU needs to prove it deserves that 2 seed; New Mexico non the brink of the lockbox themselves
2/21 bracket and thoughts
Things got a little hairy bracketing around the 11 line, when I had to juggle BYU's needs along with the needs of the First Four and the fact that two of them were Big 12 teams. I'm not thrilled about some things in the bracket:
- I sent Cincy to Buffalo to help alleviate a logjam in the midwest.
- A few disadvantages on the 3 line - Creighton has SFA in San Antonio, 'Nova has to play NCCU in Raleigh, and Iowa St gets Mercer in Orlando.
There's some rematches that I just couldn't avoid: Baylor could get Kentucky again in the round of 64 (unavoidable because of the mess that BYU caused), Cincy/Xavier in the round of 32.
I want to see how the committee handles conference rematches - they have flexibility in the rules to actually create more conference clashes in the tourney, but will have the option to still avoid them when possible. But to do that, they would need to geographically disadvantage some teams. Interesting to see which lines the NCAA will take on that.
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (24-2) vs. 16) Yale (12-9)/High Point (11-13)
8) New Mexico (20-5) vs. 9) Arizona St (19-7)
@Spokane
4) Michigan (18-7) vs. 13) Delaware (20-8)
5) Virginia (22-5) vs. 12) North Dakota St (17-6)
@Buffalo
3) Cincinnati (24-3) vs. 14) Boston (20-8)
6) Texas (20-6) vs. 11) Xavier (17-8)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (21-6) vs. 15) Davidson (15-11)
7) UMass (20-5) vs. 10) Stanford (17-8)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (24-2) vs. 16) Weber St (12-9)
8) Pittsburgh (20-6) vs. 9) G. Washington (20-6)
@Orlando
4) Iowa St (20-5) vs. 13) Mercer (18-6)
5) Kentucky (20-6) vs. 12) St John's (18-9)/Baylor (15-9)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (21-5) vs. 14) Western Michigan (16-8)
6) Memphis (19-6) vs. 11) BYU (18-10)
@San Antonio
2) San Diego St (21-2) vs. 15) UC Irvine (16-9)
7) Oklahoma (19-7) vs. 10) California (17-9)
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (25-1) vs. 16) Robert Morris (17-11)
8) Colorado (20-7) vs. 9) Gonzaga (22-5)
@San Diego
4) St Louis (23-2) vs. 13) Belmont (20-8)
5) Ohio St (21-6) vs. 12) UTEP (18-7)
@Raleigh
3) Villanova (23-3) vs. 14) North Carolina Central (18-5)
6) UConn (21-5) vs. 11) St Joseph's (18-7)
@Milwaukee
2) Michigan St (22-5) vs. 15) Vermont (16-9)
7) Kansas St (18-8) vs. 10) Missouri (19-7)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (27-0) vs. 16) Utah Valley (14-9)/Alabama St (11-9)
8) VCU (20-6) vs. 9) SMU (21-6)
@Spokane
4) Iowa (19-6) vs. 13) Iona (17-8)
5) North Carolina (19-7) vs. 12) Green Bay (19-5)
@San Antonio
3) Creighton (22-4) vs. 14) Stephen F Austin (20-2)
6) UCLA (21-5) vs. 11) Tennessee (15-10)/Oklahoma St (16-10)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (20-6) vs. 15) Georgia St (17-7)
7) Louisville (22-4) vs. 10) Minnesota (16-10)
- I sent Cincy to Buffalo to help alleviate a logjam in the midwest.
- A few disadvantages on the 3 line - Creighton has SFA in San Antonio, 'Nova has to play NCCU in Raleigh, and Iowa St gets Mercer in Orlando.
There's some rematches that I just couldn't avoid: Baylor could get Kentucky again in the round of 64 (unavoidable because of the mess that BYU caused), Cincy/Xavier in the round of 32.
I want to see how the committee handles conference rematches - they have flexibility in the rules to actually create more conference clashes in the tourney, but will have the option to still avoid them when possible. But to do that, they would need to geographically disadvantage some teams. Interesting to see which lines the NCAA will take on that.
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (24-2) vs. 16) Yale (12-9)/High Point (11-13)
8) New Mexico (20-5) vs. 9) Arizona St (19-7)
@Spokane
4) Michigan (18-7) vs. 13) Delaware (20-8)
5) Virginia (22-5) vs. 12) North Dakota St (17-6)
@Buffalo
3) Cincinnati (24-3) vs. 14) Boston (20-8)
6) Texas (20-6) vs. 11) Xavier (17-8)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (21-6) vs. 15) Davidson (15-11)
7) UMass (20-5) vs. 10) Stanford (17-8)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (24-2) vs. 16) Weber St (12-9)
8) Pittsburgh (20-6) vs. 9) G. Washington (20-6)
@Orlando
4) Iowa St (20-5) vs. 13) Mercer (18-6)
5) Kentucky (20-6) vs. 12) St John's (18-9)/Baylor (15-9)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (21-5) vs. 14) Western Michigan (16-8)
6) Memphis (19-6) vs. 11) BYU (18-10)
@San Antonio
2) San Diego St (21-2) vs. 15) UC Irvine (16-9)
7) Oklahoma (19-7) vs. 10) California (17-9)
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (25-1) vs. 16) Robert Morris (17-11)
8) Colorado (20-7) vs. 9) Gonzaga (22-5)
@San Diego
4) St Louis (23-2) vs. 13) Belmont (20-8)
5) Ohio St (21-6) vs. 12) UTEP (18-7)
@Raleigh
3) Villanova (23-3) vs. 14) North Carolina Central (18-5)
6) UConn (21-5) vs. 11) St Joseph's (18-7)
@Milwaukee
2) Michigan St (22-5) vs. 15) Vermont (16-9)
7) Kansas St (18-8) vs. 10) Missouri (19-7)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (27-0) vs. 16) Utah Valley (14-9)/Alabama St (11-9)
8) VCU (20-6) vs. 9) SMU (21-6)
@Spokane
4) Iowa (19-6) vs. 13) Iona (17-8)
5) North Carolina (19-7) vs. 12) Green Bay (19-5)
@San Antonio
3) Creighton (22-4) vs. 14) Stephen F Austin (20-2)
6) UCLA (21-5) vs. 11) Tennessee (15-10)/Oklahoma St (16-10)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (20-6) vs. 15) Georgia St (17-7)
7) Louisville (22-4) vs. 10) Minnesota (16-10)
Thursday, February 20, 2014
2/20 recap
North Carolina 74, Duke 66 - We're going to have to talk about UNC as a 4 or 5 seed now, at least. Duke's margin of error for a 1 seed is almost gone; I don't see how they get there without a big chip, like Syracuse.
Michigan St 94, Purdue 79 - Every road win is big for MSU right now.
Nebraska 80, Penn St 67
Seton Hall 82, Georgetown 67 - Marginal road loss for G'town. C'mon guys, make my life easier.
Oregon St 68, Washington St 57
Stanford 80, USC 59
Memphis 64, Rutgers 59
UConn 68, Temple 55
Texas A&M 63, Alabama 48 - Still no upset in the SEC this week, which is a minor miracle.
BYU 73, Gonzaga 65 - Gonzaga is no lock, folks. Recognize this. BYU just needs to avoid bad losses. Please, make things simple and avoid bad losses.
San Francisco 73, St Mary's 62 - In case any rogue bracketologists still have St Mary's on their board, it's time to recognize they're not even #3 in the WCC now.
I'm sorry, I need to rant about CUSA for an abnormally long time, just for one night, I swear...
MTSU 71, Charlotte 49 - MTSU has messed everything up in CUSA. All these other teams on the fringes of the bubble desperately needs the CUSA regular season title in their corner, and MTSU is going to take it away from all of them
East Carolina 75, Louisiana Tech 68 - What a terrible, terrible road loss for a team sneaking up on the bubble.
Tulsa 71, FAU 52 - Oh, and Tulsa bombing the non-con and then going to 9-3 in the conference ain't helping CUSA either.
Southern Miss 85, UTSA 56 - Too little too late.
UTEP 72, Tulane 54 - Too little too late.
small school stuff:
RMU wins, 12-1 in the NEC
Georgia St wins, 12-1 in the 'Belt
Quinnipiac 88, Canisius 81 - Quinnipiac 1.5 behind Iona, Canisius 2.5 back
Belmont wins, 12-2 in the OVC
Green Bay 67, Valparaiso 53 - Too late for the bubble, but this should put the Horizon on ice
Utah Valley and NMSU win, UVU 0.5 games to the good in the WAC
Weber St loses to Montana, N. Colorado moves to 1 game back in the Big Sky
Toledo 60, Bowling Green 58 - Tight road win to keep faint hopes alive
UC Irvine wins at Hawaii to maintain the Big West lead
Friday preview:
A NEW S-CURVE, we start twice-a-week projections.
Mercer at FGCU - Mercer is 1 up and can salt away the A-Sun with a road win here (and a shot at the 12 line or even 11 line by running the table)
VCU at UMass - Both figure to make the tournament, but this is all about seeding. VCU can add a signature road win, UMass can add some quality to a profile with a lot of quantity
In the MAAC, Iona (14-2) visits Rider, might be a tricky spot, 1.5 up
Yale and Harvard have manageable road games as well
Michigan St 94, Purdue 79 - Every road win is big for MSU right now.
Nebraska 80, Penn St 67
Seton Hall 82, Georgetown 67 - Marginal road loss for G'town. C'mon guys, make my life easier.
Oregon St 68, Washington St 57
Stanford 80, USC 59
Memphis 64, Rutgers 59
UConn 68, Temple 55
Texas A&M 63, Alabama 48 - Still no upset in the SEC this week, which is a minor miracle.
BYU 73, Gonzaga 65 - Gonzaga is no lock, folks. Recognize this. BYU just needs to avoid bad losses. Please, make things simple and avoid bad losses.
San Francisco 73, St Mary's 62 - In case any rogue bracketologists still have St Mary's on their board, it's time to recognize they're not even #3 in the WCC now.
I'm sorry, I need to rant about CUSA for an abnormally long time, just for one night, I swear...
MTSU 71, Charlotte 49 - MTSU has messed everything up in CUSA. All these other teams on the fringes of the bubble desperately needs the CUSA regular season title in their corner, and MTSU is going to take it away from all of them
East Carolina 75, Louisiana Tech 68 - What a terrible, terrible road loss for a team sneaking up on the bubble.
Tulsa 71, FAU 52 - Oh, and Tulsa bombing the non-con and then going to 9-3 in the conference ain't helping CUSA either.
Southern Miss 85, UTSA 56 - Too little too late.
UTEP 72, Tulane 54 - Too little too late.
small school stuff:
RMU wins, 12-1 in the NEC
Georgia St wins, 12-1 in the 'Belt
Quinnipiac 88, Canisius 81 - Quinnipiac 1.5 behind Iona, Canisius 2.5 back
Belmont wins, 12-2 in the OVC
Green Bay 67, Valparaiso 53 - Too late for the bubble, but this should put the Horizon on ice
Utah Valley and NMSU win, UVU 0.5 games to the good in the WAC
Weber St loses to Montana, N. Colorado moves to 1 game back in the Big Sky
Toledo 60, Bowling Green 58 - Tight road win to keep faint hopes alive
UC Irvine wins at Hawaii to maintain the Big West lead
Friday preview:
A NEW S-CURVE, we start twice-a-week projections.
Mercer at FGCU - Mercer is 1 up and can salt away the A-Sun with a road win here (and a shot at the 12 line or even 11 line by running the table)
VCU at UMass - Both figure to make the tournament, but this is all about seeding. VCU can add a signature road win, UMass can add some quality to a profile with a lot of quantity
In the MAAC, Iona (14-2) visits Rider, might be a tricky spot, 1.5 up
Yale and Harvard have manageable road games as well
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
2/19 recap
Kansas St 65, TCU 53
Illinois 62, Minnesota 49 - I'm sorry, but that's a terrible home loss, Minny. in trouble now
Ohio St 76, Northwestern 60
Colorado 61, Arizona St 52 - both teams are fine, really
UCLA 86, California 66 - big road win, UCLA is just about locked in. Cal just needs bad loss avoidance at this stage
Arizona 67, Utah 63 (OT)
Oregon 78, Washington 71
Boston College 62, Syracuse 59 (OT) - well, that's one way to lose your first game of the season - in a horribly catastrophic loss that would destroy anyone's resume
Florida 71, Auburn 66 - this almost didn't end well
Creighton 85, Marquette 70 - that's probably it for Marquette's courtesy look at the bubble
Xavier 83, DePaul 64
Cincinnati 77, UCF 49 - a blowout road win on a night like this is noteworthy
SMU 68, Houston 64
LSU 92, Mississippi St 81
Missouri 67, Vanderbilt 64
Arkansas 71, South Carolina 64 - you're not gonna believe this, but the SEC bubble teams behaved for one night
St Louis 89, George Mason 85 (OT)
St Joseph's 57, Rhode Island 54 - every road win is a big win
Dayton 65, LaSalle 53
New Mexico 68, UNLV 56 - road win, the end of UNLV's fleeting hopes, and probably the intro of New Mexico to lockboxdom
Wichita St 88, Loyola 74
Indiana St 59, Evansville 54
small-school stuff:
Boston 71, American 62
Big South standings: 9-4 Coastal Carolina, 9-4 VMI, 9-4 High point, 4 teams on 8-5, what a mess
Western Michigan beats Ohio on the road, on 10-3 in the MAC
most of the other leaders held serve around the country
Thursday:
Penn St at Nebraska - ok, Nebraska, prove you belong here in these recaps the next month
Duke at North Carolina
Georgetown at Seton Hall - mandatory for G'town
Gonzaga at BYU - mandatory for both
St Mary's at San Francisco - hey, NIT implications
lots of small school stuff as well, plus a few teams in hold-serve games
Illinois 62, Minnesota 49 - I'm sorry, but that's a terrible home loss, Minny. in trouble now
Ohio St 76, Northwestern 60
Colorado 61, Arizona St 52 - both teams are fine, really
UCLA 86, California 66 - big road win, UCLA is just about locked in. Cal just needs bad loss avoidance at this stage
Arizona 67, Utah 63 (OT)
Oregon 78, Washington 71
Boston College 62, Syracuse 59 (OT) - well, that's one way to lose your first game of the season - in a horribly catastrophic loss that would destroy anyone's resume
Florida 71, Auburn 66 - this almost didn't end well
Creighton 85, Marquette 70 - that's probably it for Marquette's courtesy look at the bubble
Xavier 83, DePaul 64
Cincinnati 77, UCF 49 - a blowout road win on a night like this is noteworthy
SMU 68, Houston 64
LSU 92, Mississippi St 81
Missouri 67, Vanderbilt 64
Arkansas 71, South Carolina 64 - you're not gonna believe this, but the SEC bubble teams behaved for one night
St Louis 89, George Mason 85 (OT)
St Joseph's 57, Rhode Island 54 - every road win is a big win
Dayton 65, LaSalle 53
New Mexico 68, UNLV 56 - road win, the end of UNLV's fleeting hopes, and probably the intro of New Mexico to lockboxdom
Wichita St 88, Loyola 74
Indiana St 59, Evansville 54
small-school stuff:
Boston 71, American 62
Big South standings: 9-4 Coastal Carolina, 9-4 VMI, 9-4 High point, 4 teams on 8-5, what a mess
Western Michigan beats Ohio on the road, on 10-3 in the MAC
most of the other leaders held serve around the country
Thursday:
Penn St at Nebraska - ok, Nebraska, prove you belong here in these recaps the next month
Duke at North Carolina
Georgetown at Seton Hall - mandatory for G'town
Gonzaga at BYU - mandatory for both
St Mary's at San Francisco - hey, NIT implications
lots of small school stuff as well, plus a few teams in hold-serve games
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
2/18 recap
Iowa St 85, Texas 76 - Texas, on the edge of 4/5 seed territory, doesn't get dinged for the loss, but may see the 2 line beyond reach now
Kansas 64, Texas Tech - Kansas what are you doing
Villanova 82, Providence 79 (2OT) - a golden chance for the signature win it needs goes by the boards for Providence; no change in status for either, really
St John's 77, Butler 52
Maryland 71, Wake Forest 60 - I may allow UM to linger on the bubble for awhile
Clemson 73, NC State 56 - NC State is about done here; Clemson will linger on the bubble for awhile as well
Duke 68, Georgia Tech 51
Virginia 57, Virginia Tech 53
Kentucky 84, Ole Miss 70 - and Ole Miss is just about done here
Tennessee 67, Georgia 48 - for once, the SEC behaved itself for a night
George Washington 73, Richmond 65 - GWU with a quality road win, shouldn't really bring the bubble into play for them. Richmond on the other hand...this one hurts a lot. This was the spot they needed a result in
Louisville 80, USF 54
San Diego St 60, Utah St 45
Boise and Wyoming also won; no amount of winning will probably get them to the bubble, but NIT implications
Wednesday:
Creighton at Marquette - well, if Marquette was ever going to be a part of the bubble, this is the spot
UCLA at California - Cal could use some cushion in the bubble race; it's time for UCLA to start winning some games to move up the board
Arizona St at Colorado - winner is going to feel pretty secure about its tourney hopes; loser should be OK for now as well
New Mexico at UNLV - last chance saloon (again) for UNLV
American at Boston - if you're wondering, Boston profiles out as a much better team. This is for the Patriot lead
In hold-serve theater: BC at Syracuse, Auburn at Florida, Cincy at UCF, St Louis at GMU, Northwestern at Ohio St, DePaul at Xavier, St Joseph's at URI, Evansville at Indiana St, Wichita St at Loyola, Houston at SMU, Miss. St at LSU, Vandy at Missouri, TCU at Kansas St, LaSalle at Dayton, Washington at Oregon, South Carolina at Arkansas, Illinois at Minnesota, Arizona at Utah. In every single one of these games, you have a bubble team (or better) playing a non-bubble team, and a loss in any of these games would range from bad to catastrophic. They can mean losing the one line (Wichita, Arizona), a protected seed (Ohio St, Cincy), lock status (SMU), the right side of the bubble (Xavier, Missouri), or off the at-large board completely (Indiana St, LSU).
Monday, February 17, 2014
S-Curve 2/17
Below will be brackets and projections for all 4 postseason tournaments. For now, this is the simple S-Curve post. Boom.
The 1 line: Syracuse (25-0), Florida (23-2), Arizona (23-2), Wichita St (26-0)
The 2 line: Kansas (19-6), Duke (20-5), San Diego St (20-2), Michigan St (21-5)
The 3 line: Villanova (22-3), Cincinnati (23-3), Creighton (21-4), Wisconsin (21-5)
The 4 line: Iowa St (19-5), St Louis (22-2), Iowa (19-6), Michigan (18-7)
The 5 line: Virginia (21-5), Texas (20-5), Kentucky (19-6), Ohio St (20-6)
The 6 line: North Carolina (17-7), UConn (20-5), Memphis (18-6), UCLA (20-5)
The 7 line: UMass (20-5), Louisville (21-4), Oklahoma (19-7), Kansas St (17-8)
The 8 line: VCU (20-6), New Mexico (19-5), Gonzaga (22-4), Arizona St (19-6)
The 9 line: Pittsburgh (20-6), Minnesota (16-9), G. Washington (19-6), Colorado (19-7)
The 10 line: SMU (20-6), California (17-8), Xavier (16-8), Oklahoma St (16-9)
The 11 line: Stanford (16-8), St Joseph's (17-7), Missouri (18-7), Georgetown (15-10), Tennessee (14-10)
The 12 line: Richmond (17-8), BYU (17-10), Green Bay (18-5), North Dakota St (17-6), UTEP (17-7)
The 13 line: Mercer (18-6), Belmont (19-8), Delaware (19-7), Iona (17-8)
The 14 line: Boston (19-8), Stephen F Austin (22-2), North Carolina Central (17-5), Western Michigan (15-8)
The 15 line: Georgia St (15-7), UC Irvine (15-9), Davidson (14-11), Vermont (15-9)
The 16 line: Robert Morris (16-11), Weber St (12-7), Yale (12-9), Utah Valley (13-9), Coastal Carolina (13-10), Alabama St (11-9)
Bubble in:
VCU, New Mexico, *Gonzaga, Arizona St, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, G. Washington, Colorado, SMU, Calfornia, Xavier
Next 4 in:
OKlahoma St
Stanford
St Joseph's
Missouri
Last 4 in:
Georgetown
Tennessee
Richmond
BYU
Last 4 out:
St John's (17-9)
Providence (17-9)
Arkansas (16-9)
Baylor (14-9)
Next 4 out:
Oregon (16-8)
Indiana St (18-6)
Florida St (15-10)
LSU (15-9)
Bubble inception: WE NEED TO GO DEEPER
Dayton (17-8)
Nebraska (14-10)
West Virginia (15-11)
Clemson (15-9)
Ole Miss (16-9)
Louisiana Tech (20-5)
North Carolina St (16-9)
Toledo (20-4)
Southern Miss (19-5)
The 1 line: Syracuse (25-0), Florida (23-2), Arizona (23-2), Wichita St (26-0)
The 2 line: Kansas (19-6), Duke (20-5), San Diego St (20-2), Michigan St (21-5)
The 3 line: Villanova (22-3), Cincinnati (23-3), Creighton (21-4), Wisconsin (21-5)
The 4 line: Iowa St (19-5), St Louis (22-2), Iowa (19-6), Michigan (18-7)
The 5 line: Virginia (21-5), Texas (20-5), Kentucky (19-6), Ohio St (20-6)
The 6 line: North Carolina (17-7), UConn (20-5), Memphis (18-6), UCLA (20-5)
The 7 line: UMass (20-5), Louisville (21-4), Oklahoma (19-7), Kansas St (17-8)
The 8 line: VCU (20-6), New Mexico (19-5), Gonzaga (22-4), Arizona St (19-6)
The 9 line: Pittsburgh (20-6), Minnesota (16-9), G. Washington (19-6), Colorado (19-7)
The 10 line: SMU (20-6), California (17-8), Xavier (16-8), Oklahoma St (16-9)
The 11 line: Stanford (16-8), St Joseph's (17-7), Missouri (18-7), Georgetown (15-10), Tennessee (14-10)
The 12 line: Richmond (17-8), BYU (17-10), Green Bay (18-5), North Dakota St (17-6), UTEP (17-7)
The 13 line: Mercer (18-6), Belmont (19-8), Delaware (19-7), Iona (17-8)
The 14 line: Boston (19-8), Stephen F Austin (22-2), North Carolina Central (17-5), Western Michigan (15-8)
The 15 line: Georgia St (15-7), UC Irvine (15-9), Davidson (14-11), Vermont (15-9)
The 16 line: Robert Morris (16-11), Weber St (12-7), Yale (12-9), Utah Valley (13-9), Coastal Carolina (13-10), Alabama St (11-9)
Bubble in:
VCU, New Mexico, *Gonzaga, Arizona St, Pittsburgh, Minnesota, G. Washington, Colorado, SMU, Calfornia, Xavier
Next 4 in:
OKlahoma St
Stanford
St Joseph's
Missouri
Last 4 in:
Georgetown
Tennessee
Richmond
BYU
Last 4 out:
St John's (17-9)
Providence (17-9)
Arkansas (16-9)
Baylor (14-9)
Next 4 out:
Oregon (16-8)
Indiana St (18-6)
Florida St (15-10)
LSU (15-9)
Bubble inception: WE NEED TO GO DEEPER
Dayton (17-8)
Nebraska (14-10)
West Virginia (15-11)
Clemson (15-9)
Ole Miss (16-9)
Louisiana Tech (20-5)
North Carolina St (16-9)
Toledo (20-4)
Southern Miss (19-5)
2/17 recap
North Carolina 81, Florida St 75 - FSU has to be out of lives by now
Baylor 70, Oklahoma St 64 (OT) - at what point do we yank them out of the bracket entirely? I think if they lose the next one with Smart, then yes
Towson 78, Delaware 63 - could be worth a difference between the 13 line and 14 line in March for UD
Davidson, Georgia St, NCCU hold serve in their conferences. Weber St loses, still leads the Big Sky, but the Dayton games are in play for them
Tuesday:
Villanova at Providence - a chance to get a bubble elixir for Provi
Kentucky at Ole Miss - probably Ole Miss' last stand; UK needs to be an accumulator of wins now
Texas at Iowa St - massive protected seeding stakes here
NC State at Clemson - winner gets to stay on the bubble!
G. Washington at Richmond - Richmond desperately needs to add quality wins; GWU desperately needs to avoid a slide that puts them back on the bubble; high stakes here too
Kansas at Texas Tech - every game matters now for KU's pursuit of the 1 line
Duke at Georgia Tech - same for Duke
Iowa at Indiana - same for Iowa, except we're talking 2 line
Virginia at Virginia Tech - same for Iowa; 4 road games in a row here; nobody trip now
Georgia at Tennessee - it's funny to see Georgia ruining the SEC's bubble hopes by getting in the way
San Diego St at Utah St
Butler at St John's
Baylor 70, Oklahoma St 64 (OT) - at what point do we yank them out of the bracket entirely? I think if they lose the next one with Smart, then yes
Towson 78, Delaware 63 - could be worth a difference between the 13 line and 14 line in March for UD
Davidson, Georgia St, NCCU hold serve in their conferences. Weber St loses, still leads the Big Sky, but the Dayton games are in play for them
Tuesday:
Villanova at Providence - a chance to get a bubble elixir for Provi
Kentucky at Ole Miss - probably Ole Miss' last stand; UK needs to be an accumulator of wins now
Texas at Iowa St - massive protected seeding stakes here
NC State at Clemson - winner gets to stay on the bubble!
G. Washington at Richmond - Richmond desperately needs to add quality wins; GWU desperately needs to avoid a slide that puts them back on the bubble; high stakes here too
Kansas at Texas Tech - every game matters now for KU's pursuit of the 1 line
Duke at Georgia Tech - same for Duke
Iowa at Indiana - same for Iowa, except we're talking 2 line
Virginia at Virginia Tech - same for Iowa; 4 road games in a row here; nobody trip now
Georgia at Tennessee - it's funny to see Georgia ruining the SEC's bubble hopes by getting in the way
San Diego St at Utah St
Butler at St John's
Southern U.
This is new, but it appears they may be postseason ineligible. Apparently announced Thursday; slipped my radar until now. I don't believe final word has been thrown down on the issue, but the NCAA is investigating or something. Until further notice, be aware. I'll be projecting Alabama St in the meantime.
In-depth bracket thoughts 2/17
I want to expound on a few things, moreso than I did in last night's post.
We have a pretty clear Top 4, and I think all four teams could survive a loss and stay on the 1 line right now. Florida passes the eye list, Arizona has 4 road/neutral wins against the top 25 in the S-Curve, and the other two are undefeated. There is a mile of difference between #4 Wichita and #5 Kansas.
I'm waiting for others to drop Pitt accordingly. Actually, this last week, losing to Syracuse and UNC wasn't bad, but they should've been a 9 seed before then, and should hold that seed now.
It's entirely possible I'm shorting UMass. 11 road/neutral wins, 12 wins vs. top 100. I feel like that should be a 5 seed, minimum. If they steady themselves, they'll rocket back up the board. I also moved up St Louis now that they have a quality win. They have more chances coming, so they will be bouncing around.
I've demoted Louisville to the 7 line. The profile is barren. It's possible I'm overreacting, but 2 wins over tourney teams and dropping winnable home games just aren't representative of a 4 or 5 seed. They do have a shiny R/N record, though. This seed could easily rebound.
Wisconsin is 4th in the B1G but should be 2nd among B1G teams in your S-Curves. They've steadied, and their overall profile is signature. They have 6 wins against teams in the top 20 on my S-Curve. Too many quality wins. We were correct to adjust for their slump, now we need to correct back.
Over in bubble land, you tell me what to do with the SEC. Please. I have to imagine they'll end up with 4 bids, because someone's going to have to win these conference games down the stretch. But what a mess. Over in the A-10, they have 6 bids, but are there enough quality wins to go around to support St Joe's and Richmond? If I had to bet, one of them would miss. I have G'town in and Provi/St John's out. I bet two of those three eventually make it, given bubble attrition.
Based on tiebreakers, Western Michigan (head-to-head versus Akron and Toledo) is my projected MAC champ. Others will blindly put in Toledo, and I'm ok with that. Another such example in my bracket: Yale > Harvard in my bracket. I have UTEP over LaTech and MTSU for now as well.
I may add more to this post later in the day as I think of them.
We have a pretty clear Top 4, and I think all four teams could survive a loss and stay on the 1 line right now. Florida passes the eye list, Arizona has 4 road/neutral wins against the top 25 in the S-Curve, and the other two are undefeated. There is a mile of difference between #4 Wichita and #5 Kansas.
I'm waiting for others to drop Pitt accordingly. Actually, this last week, losing to Syracuse and UNC wasn't bad, but they should've been a 9 seed before then, and should hold that seed now.
It's entirely possible I'm shorting UMass. 11 road/neutral wins, 12 wins vs. top 100. I feel like that should be a 5 seed, minimum. If they steady themselves, they'll rocket back up the board. I also moved up St Louis now that they have a quality win. They have more chances coming, so they will be bouncing around.
I've demoted Louisville to the 7 line. The profile is barren. It's possible I'm overreacting, but 2 wins over tourney teams and dropping winnable home games just aren't representative of a 4 or 5 seed. They do have a shiny R/N record, though. This seed could easily rebound.
Wisconsin is 4th in the B1G but should be 2nd among B1G teams in your S-Curves. They've steadied, and their overall profile is signature. They have 6 wins against teams in the top 20 on my S-Curve. Too many quality wins. We were correct to adjust for their slump, now we need to correct back.
Over in bubble land, you tell me what to do with the SEC. Please. I have to imagine they'll end up with 4 bids, because someone's going to have to win these conference games down the stretch. But what a mess. Over in the A-10, they have 6 bids, but are there enough quality wins to go around to support St Joe's and Richmond? If I had to bet, one of them would miss. I have G'town in and Provi/St John's out. I bet two of those three eventually make it, given bubble attrition.
Based on tiebreakers, Western Michigan (head-to-head versus Akron and Toledo) is my projected MAC champ. Others will blindly put in Toledo, and I'm ok with that. Another such example in my bracket: Yale > Harvard in my bracket. I have UTEP over LaTech and MTSU for now as well.
I may add more to this post later in the day as I think of them.
Sunday, February 16, 2014
2/17 NIT/CBI/CIT projections
Remember: NIT projections assume a massive BCS bias from the NIT selection committee, hence the low seeds of several quality mid-major teams. I'm going for realism in the projections.
NIT
1) Providence (17-9) vs. 8) Harvard (19-4)
4) Ole Miss (16-9) vs. 5) Louisiana Tech (20-5)
3) Clemson (15-9) vs. 6) Toledo (20-4)
2) LSU (15-9) vs. 7) UNLV (17-8)
1) St John's (17-9) vs. 8) Manhattan (19-6)
4) North Carolina St (16-9) vs. 5) Vanderbilt (14-10)
3) West Virginia (15-11) vs. 6) Georgia (14-10)
2) Florida St (15-10) vs. 7) Southern Miss (19-5)
1) Arkansas (16-9) vs. 8) Middle Tennessee (17-7)
4) Indiana (14-11) vs. 5) Marquette (15-10)
3) Dayton (17-8) vs. 6) Maryland (14-12)
2) Indiana St (18-6) vs. 7) Ohio (17-7)
1) Baylor (14-9) vs. 8) New Mexico St (19-8)
4) Utah (15-8) vs. 5) Wyoming (14-9)
3) Nebraska (14-10) vs. 6) St Mary's (18-8)
2) Oregon (16-8) vs. 7) Boise St (14-9)
For the CBI, I assume every major conference team would accept a bid if given. Obviously most won't, but I can't guess who would and who wouldn't this early.
CBI
LaSalle (12-12) at Seton Hall (13-12)
Towson (16-9) at Wake Forest (14-11)
Quinnipiac (17-8) at Purdue (15-10)
Akron (17-8) at Cleveland St (16-10)
Missouri St (16-9) at Texas Tech (13-12)
Tulsa (13-12) at Texas A&M (14-11)
Utah St (14-10) at Washington (14-12)
UCSB (14-7) at San Francisco (14-10)
CIT projections are more straightforward.
CIT
Brown (12-9) at St Bonaventure (15-10)
Bryant (15-10) at Stony Brook (17-8)
Holy Cross (16-10) at Canisius (18-8)
Drexel (14-11) at Buffalo (13-8)
American (15-10) at William & Mary (14-9)
VMI (11-10) at FGCU (15-10)
Norfolk St (11-11) at Charlotte (14-10)
Chattanooga (13-11) at Morehead St (16-9)
UAB (13-10) at Murray St (14-9)
Milwaukee (15-10) at Illinois St (13-12)
Western Kentucky (16-9) atEastern Michigan (12-10)
Valparaiso (13-11) at IPFW (16-9)
Hawaii (16-7) at Pepperdine (13-13)
Northern Colorado (13-8) at Colorado St (12-12)
Louisiana-Lafayette (14-9) at Sam Houston St (15-6)
South Dakota St (13-10) at Portland (15-11)
NIT
1) Providence (17-9) vs. 8) Harvard (19-4)
4) Ole Miss (16-9) vs. 5) Louisiana Tech (20-5)
3) Clemson (15-9) vs. 6) Toledo (20-4)
2) LSU (15-9) vs. 7) UNLV (17-8)
1) St John's (17-9) vs. 8) Manhattan (19-6)
4) North Carolina St (16-9) vs. 5) Vanderbilt (14-10)
3) West Virginia (15-11) vs. 6) Georgia (14-10)
2) Florida St (15-10) vs. 7) Southern Miss (19-5)
1) Arkansas (16-9) vs. 8) Middle Tennessee (17-7)
4) Indiana (14-11) vs. 5) Marquette (15-10)
3) Dayton (17-8) vs. 6) Maryland (14-12)
2) Indiana St (18-6) vs. 7) Ohio (17-7)
1) Baylor (14-9) vs. 8) New Mexico St (19-8)
4) Utah (15-8) vs. 5) Wyoming (14-9)
3) Nebraska (14-10) vs. 6) St Mary's (18-8)
2) Oregon (16-8) vs. 7) Boise St (14-9)
For the CBI, I assume every major conference team would accept a bid if given. Obviously most won't, but I can't guess who would and who wouldn't this early.
CBI
LaSalle (12-12) at Seton Hall (13-12)
Towson (16-9) at Wake Forest (14-11)
Quinnipiac (17-8) at Purdue (15-10)
Akron (17-8) at Cleveland St (16-10)
Missouri St (16-9) at Texas Tech (13-12)
Tulsa (13-12) at Texas A&M (14-11)
Utah St (14-10) at Washington (14-12)
UCSB (14-7) at San Francisco (14-10)
CIT projections are more straightforward.
CIT
Brown (12-9) at St Bonaventure (15-10)
Bryant (15-10) at Stony Brook (17-8)
Holy Cross (16-10) at Canisius (18-8)
Drexel (14-11) at Buffalo (13-8)
American (15-10) at William & Mary (14-9)
VMI (11-10) at FGCU (15-10)
Norfolk St (11-11) at Charlotte (14-10)
Chattanooga (13-11) at Morehead St (16-9)
UAB (13-10) at Murray St (14-9)
Milwaukee (15-10) at Illinois St (13-12)
Western Kentucky (16-9) atEastern Michigan (12-10)
Valparaiso (13-11) at IPFW (16-9)
Hawaii (16-7) at Pepperdine (13-13)
Northern Colorado (13-8) at Colorado St (12-12)
Louisiana-Lafayette (14-9) at Sam Houston St (15-6)
South Dakota St (13-10) at Portland (15-11)
2/17 bracket and thoughts
1) The top line: Syr/Fla/Ari/WSU. I changed order about 50 times on that one. I'm flexible to changing this in the future.
2) A-10 with 6 teams, no one else with more? Sure, why not. That probably won't last.
3) The mock selection committee decided Raleigh > Buffalo for Villanova. I'm not sure about that, but I'll play along.
4) BYU in the first four again. I hate this. Every bracketologist hates this. Other than that though, I managed to avoid most conflicts.
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (25-0) vs. 16) Yale (12-9)/Coastal Carolina (13-10)
8) VCU (20-6) vs. 9) Colorado (19-7)
@Orlando
4) Iowa St (19-5) vs. 13) Belmont (19-8)
5) Ohio St (20-6) vs. 12) Green Bay (18-5)
@Raleigh
3) Villanova (22-3) vs. 14) Stephen F Austin (22-2)
6) Memphis (18-6) vs. 11) Missouri (18-7)
@Milwaukee
2) Michigan St (21-5) vs. 15) Vermont (15-9)
7) Oklahoma (19-7) vs. 10) California (17-8)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (26-0) vs. 16) Utah Valley (13-9)/Alabama St (11-9)
8) New Mexico (19-5) vs. 9) G. Washington (19-6)
@Spokane
4) Michigan (18-7) vs. 13) Delaware (19-7)
5) Kentucky (19-6) vs. 12) North Dakota St (17-6)
@Buffalo
3) Cincinnati (23-3) vs. 14) Boston (19-8)
6) UCLA (20-5) vs. 11) St Joseph's (17-7)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (20-5) vs. 15) Georgia St (15-7)
7) Kansas St (17-8) vs. 10) SMU (20-6)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (23-2) vs. 16) Weber St (12-7)
8) Gonzaga (22-4) vs. 9) Pittsburgh (20-6)
@Spokane
4) Iowa (19-6) vs. 13) Iona (17-8)
5) Texas (20-5) vs. 12) BYU (17-10)/Georgetown (15-10)
@San Antonio
3) Creighton (21-4) vs. 14) North Carolina Central (17-5)
6) North Carolina (17-7) vs. 11) Richmond (17-8)/Tennessee (14-10)
@San Antonio
2) San Diego St (20-2) vs. 15) UC Irvine (15-9)
7) UMass (20-5) vs. 10) Oklahoma St (16-9)
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (23-2) vs. 16) Robert Morris (16-11)
8) Arizona St (19-6) vs. 9) Minnesota (16-9)
@San Diego
4) St Louis (22-2) vs. 13) Mercer (18-6)
5) Virginia (21-5) vs. 12) UTEP (17-7)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (21-5) vs. 14) Western Michigan (15-8)
6) UConn (20-5) vs. 11) Stanford (16-8)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (19-6) vs. 15) Davidson (14-11)
7) Louisville (21-4) vs. 10) Xavier (16-8)
Break it down!
A-10 6
Big 12 6
B1G 6
Pac-12 6
ACC 5
American 5
Big East 4
SEC 4
WCC 2
MW 2
2) A-10 with 6 teams, no one else with more? Sure, why not. That probably won't last.
3) The mock selection committee decided Raleigh > Buffalo for Villanova. I'm not sure about that, but I'll play along.
4) BYU in the first four again. I hate this. Every bracketologist hates this. Other than that though, I managed to avoid most conflicts.
EAST
@Buffalo
1) Syracuse (25-0) vs. 16) Yale (12-9)/Coastal Carolina (13-10)
8) VCU (20-6) vs. 9) Colorado (19-7)
@Orlando
4) Iowa St (19-5) vs. 13) Belmont (19-8)
5) Ohio St (20-6) vs. 12) Green Bay (18-5)
@Raleigh
3) Villanova (22-3) vs. 14) Stephen F Austin (22-2)
6) Memphis (18-6) vs. 11) Missouri (18-7)
@Milwaukee
2) Michigan St (21-5) vs. 15) Vermont (15-9)
7) Oklahoma (19-7) vs. 10) California (17-8)
MIDWEST
@St Louis
1) Wichita St (26-0) vs. 16) Utah Valley (13-9)/Alabama St (11-9)
8) New Mexico (19-5) vs. 9) G. Washington (19-6)
@Spokane
4) Michigan (18-7) vs. 13) Delaware (19-7)
5) Kentucky (19-6) vs. 12) North Dakota St (17-6)
@Buffalo
3) Cincinnati (23-3) vs. 14) Boston (19-8)
6) UCLA (20-5) vs. 11) St Joseph's (17-7)
@Raleigh
2) Duke (20-5) vs. 15) Georgia St (15-7)
7) Kansas St (17-8) vs. 10) SMU (20-6)
WEST
@San Diego
1) Arizona (23-2) vs. 16) Weber St (12-7)
8) Gonzaga (22-4) vs. 9) Pittsburgh (20-6)
@Spokane
4) Iowa (19-6) vs. 13) Iona (17-8)
5) Texas (20-5) vs. 12) BYU (17-10)/Georgetown (15-10)
@San Antonio
3) Creighton (21-4) vs. 14) North Carolina Central (17-5)
6) North Carolina (17-7) vs. 11) Richmond (17-8)/Tennessee (14-10)
@San Antonio
2) San Diego St (20-2) vs. 15) UC Irvine (15-9)
7) UMass (20-5) vs. 10) Oklahoma St (16-9)
SOUTH
@Orlando
1) Florida (23-2) vs. 16) Robert Morris (16-11)
8) Arizona St (19-6) vs. 9) Minnesota (16-9)
@San Diego
4) St Louis (22-2) vs. 13) Mercer (18-6)
5) Virginia (21-5) vs. 12) UTEP (17-7)
@Milwaukee
3) Wisconsin (21-5) vs. 14) Western Michigan (15-8)
6) UConn (20-5) vs. 11) Stanford (16-8)
@St Louis
2) Kansas (19-6) vs. 15) Davidson (14-11)
7) Louisville (21-4) vs. 10) Xavier (16-8)
Break it down!
A-10 6
Big 12 6
B1G 6
Pac-12 6
ACC 5
American 5
Big East 4
SEC 4
WCC 2
MW 2
2/17 Bubble Watch
One more presentation of my personal cheat sheet. I've edited it to make it presentable. This is my generic cheat sheet with the basic information I need to bracket. Use it for whatever you so desire.
This is probably the last time I'll post it; it'll be March by the next time a useful update can be applied.
EIEIO watch
Everyone in the conference who isn't NMSU has a garbage resume, for the record. NMSU swept UTEP and won at New Mexico, so there.
This is probably the last time I'll post it; it'll be March by the next time a useful update can be applied.
America East
Conference championship watch
Vermont (15-9) (11-1) RPI 110 SoS 207
Stony Brook (17-8) (10-2) RPI 177 SoS 319
At least Vermont won @Yale and N-Illinois St. Frankly, all the profiles in A-East suggest
play-in games, but Vermont has a reasonable shot of avoiding. There's not much to see here.
EIEIO watch
Albany (13-13) (7-6) RPI 230 SoS 291 - if you have to have a 3rd
team. Hartford is 3rd in the conference,
by the way
No postseason
Hartford, *UMass-Lowell, UMBC, New Hampshire, Binghamton, Maine
American
Lockbox
Cincinnati (23-3) (12-1) RPI 16 SoS 81
Vital signs: 6-3 R/N, non-con
SoS 103, 5-3 vs. Top 50, 8-3 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 156/35
Quality wins: UConn, N-Pitt,
@Memphis, @L-ville, SMU, NC St?
Bad losses: perhaps @SMU and N-Xavier
if they want a truly high seed
Acing the American schedule to date has put them in a good position for
a high seed; just not 1 or 2. All 3
losses are R/N losses against decent but not great teams, and road wins at
Memphis and L'ville erase those sins.
Memphis (18-6) (8-4) RPI 33 SoS 61
Vital signs: 7-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 71, 3-6 vs. Top 50, 4-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 178/26
Quality wins: Gonzaga, @L-ville,
N-Oklahoma St and LSU
Bad losses: swept by UConn...OSU
ended up being a split...all 6 losses inside top 50
A pretty standard lock profile at this point. They've got some high profile games left in
conference play, so the seeding may be variant in the next month, but it'll
take losses in all of them to bring the bubble into play.
Connecticut (20-5) (8-4) RPI 24 SoS 63
Vital signs: 7-3 R/N, non-con
SoS 67, 3-4 vs. Top 50, 7-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 145/61
Quality wins: Florida, sweep of
Memphis, Harvard and N-Maryland?
Bad losses: @Houston...I suppose
Stanford?
The sweep of Memphis helps bolster the lack of quantity in the
profile. Should be safe for good, but
they have 3 high-profile games left in the American. I'd get a couple of them to make sure. The real trick is finding an appropriate seed
for them, especially with that Florida lynchpin.
Louisville (21-4) (10-2) RPI 34 SoS 97
Vital signs: 8-2 R/N, non-con
SoS 156, 3-4 vs. Top 50, 3-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 181/24
Quality wins: @UConn, SMU and
USM at home?
Bad losses: none, perhaps home
to Cincy and Memphis should've been taken care of
Their non-con still has the same holes it always had. Win at UConn is frankly saving their bacon
right now. They've got shots at Cincy
and Memphis coming, but they're roadies.
Better win one, or we'd have to revisit the lockbox status. This is an eye test team right now.
Bubble
SMU (20-6) (9-4) RPI 37 SoS 117
Vital signs: 7-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 282, 3-3 vs. Top 50, 4-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 180/63
Quality wins: Cincy, UConn,
Memphis (all at home), @Wyoming?
Bad losses: @USF, @Temple, @Arkansas? all 6 losses are R/N
The good news is they're winning the home games against quality
teams. At least it's something in their
pocket. Road chances at UConn and
Memphis still on the board. A split
should be enough, but if not, that non-con SoS is going to be a significant
issue.
No postseason
Houston, Rutgers, South Florida, Central Florida, Temple - behind SMU,
maybe Houston reaches .500?
ACC
Lockbox
Syracuse (25-0) (12-0) RPI 3 SoS 50
Vital signs: 9-0 R/N, non-con
SoS 93, 8-0 vs. Top 50, 13-0 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 116/0
Quality wins: Nova, Duke, UNC,
Pitt at home; @Pitt, Minny-Cal-Baylor in Maui
Bad losses: no
The real question is what to do with them if they start losing. Just estimating, they've got to lose 3 times
to lose the 1 seed at this point.
Duke (20-5) (9-3) RPI 8 SoS 9
Vital signs: 6-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 19, 4-3 vs. Top 50, 9-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 117/38
Quality wins: Michigan,
Virginia, N-UCLA, @Pitt
Bad losses: @Clemson and Notre
Dame look bad
Those 4 wins listed above might be their only 4 wins vs. tournament
teams, despite the sterling computer numbers.
This could be an issue in seeding.
A sweep of UNC and Syracuse could fix a lot of ills, or an anti-sweep
could actually push them down some seeding lines.
Virginia (21-5) (12-1) RPI 18 SoS 32
Vital signs: 9-3 R/N, non-con
SoS 43, 3-3 vs. Top 50, 9-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 138/31
Quality wins: UNC, @Pitt,
N-SMU? @NC St and FSU?
Bad losses: perhaps @Tennessee
and Green Bay
0-3 vs. Top 25 might be a slight ding when it comes to protected seeding
chances, but they're safely in the tourney.
Non-con whiffs against Wisky and VCU hurt right now.
North Carolina (17-7) (7-4) RPI 30 SoS 14
Vital signs: 5-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 22, 5-3 vs. Top 50, 8-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 123/70
Quality wins: @Michigan St,
Kentucky, N-Louisville...Pitt, N-Richmond is gaining speed
Bad losses: @UAB, Miami, @Wake,
Belmont
The consistency in ACC play is helping to erase the bad loss sins. At this point, bad loss avoidance is much
more important than getting more quality wins.
They'll become very hard to seed if they do get more signature wins,
though.
Bubble
Pittsburgh (20-6) (8-5) RPI 32 SoS 46
Vital signs: 7-3 R/N, non-con
SoS 204, 1-6 vs. Top 50, 6-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 155/13
Quality wins: N-Stanford...@NC State
and swept Maryland? Clemson at home?
Bad losses: all 6 are inside the
top 30
Um, at some point, you need quality wins. And they're out of chances against the top
4. Any loss now would be seen as a bad
loss (although @Clemson wouldn't be horrible).
All of a sudden, this is a profile in trouble, with no heft. This team is not safe, folks. Better win.
Florida St (15-10) (6-7) RPI 60 SoS 51
Vital signs: 7-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 86, 2-6 vs. Top 50, 5-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 168/41
Quality wins: N-UMass, N-VCU, uh
@Clemson and Wake?
Bad losses: Miami, Clemson,
@Maryland, @NC State, etc
A big slide has taken them on the brink of the bubble, and those
non-con results are the only thing really keeping them alive at this
point. They've got UNC and @Pitt coming
up and may need a sweep.
North Carolina St (16-9) (6-6) RPI 51 SoS 26
Vital signs: 4-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 116, 0-7 vs. Top 50, 5-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 159/42
Quality wins: @Tennessee, and
we're done here
Bad losses: NCCU at home,
probably. @Wake
The profile obviously needed the Syracuse upset, and didn't get
it. We're pretty much done here.
Clemson (15-9) (6-6) RPI 77 SoS 93
Vital signs: 5-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 275, 1-5 vs. Top 50, 3-7 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 199/56
Quality wins: Duke, @FSU
Bad losses: @Auburn, @Notre
Dame, @Arkansas
Barely hanging on thanks to the Duke win. We're pretty much done here too.
NIT watch
Maryland (14-12) (6-7) RPI 76 SoS 31
Wake Forest (14-11) (4-8) RPI 99 SoS 68
Notre Dame (14-12) (5-8) RPI 108 SoS 36 - in reality, a couple of these
teams will go below .500 soon, as will GT
No postseason
Georgia Tech, Miami, Boston College, Virginia Tech
Atlantic Sun
Conference championship watch
Mercer (18-6) (12-2) RPI 66 SoS 196
FGCU (15-10) (11-3) RPI 158 SoS 262
Mercer is the class of the league; FGCU is the only other team with
less than 6 losses in conference play.
Mercer won at Ole Miss and beat Seton Hall so that helps explain the
computer numbers and reasonable 13 seed chances.
EIEIO watch
East Tennessee St (15-12) (9-6) RPI 208 SoS 256
USC Upstate (13-12) (8-6) RPI 192 SoS 269
North Florida (12-13) (8-6) RPI 193 SoS 237 - the battle for 3rd here
could double as the battle for a CIT spot
No postseason
Lipscomb, Stetson, Jacksonville,*Northern Kentucky, Kennesaw St
A-10
Lockbox
St Louis (22-2) (10-0) RPI 13 SoS 75
Vital signs: 10-1 R/N, non-con
SoS 78, 3-2 vs. Top 50, 8-2 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 151/7
Quality wins: VCU, Richmond, @St
Joe's? Indiana St? @Dayton?
Bad losses: both are inside Top
10
Finally, a bonafide win to help support the resume. @VCU, @UMass, Dayton, GWU still on the
schedule, so the story is just beginning here.
UMass (20-5) (7-4) RPI 19 SoS 49
Vital signs: 11-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 26, 4-2 vs. Top 50, 12-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 109/74
Quality wins: N-New Mexico,
@GWU, N-BYU, St Joe's and Provi...and more marginal wins
Bad losses: George Mason? ugh.
Also @St Bonaventure
Big win at GWU helps stem the recent slide. GMU is the one loss that really stings - the
others are R/N and explainable. But 12
top 100 wins and 11 R/N wins are too good not to lockbox right now. Just stop losing marginal games.
Bubble
VCU (20-6) (8-3) RPI 23 SoS 59
Vital signs: 7-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 88, 3-3 vs. Top 50, 6-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 140/53
Quality wins: @Virginia, GWU,
Richmond, @Dayton and Belmont?
Bad losses: @UNI, N-FSU?
All losses are R/N, which slightly helps. This might be a conservative call, but I'm
not going to lock them in at this time.
They probably need to avoid disasters more than anything else.
George Washington (19-6) (7-4) RPI 36 SoS 87
Vital signs: 7-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 122, 2-3 vs. Top 50, 8-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 162/51
Quality wins: N-Creighton, VCU,
N-Maryland? eh
Bad losses: @LaSalle and
N-Marquette, perhaps
Two whiffed chances vs. UMass and at VCU mean no lockbox. They'll have to sweat a bit more. However, they have a trump card against
Creighton to play if they need it. In a
similar situation to VCU.
St Joseph's (17-7) (7-3) RPI 43 SoS 61
Vital signs: 8-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 135, 2-5 vs. Top 50, 5-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 160/49
Quality wins: UMass, VCU,
@Dayton?
Bad losses: @Temple...couple
marginal ones like N-LSU, @Richmond
This is a profile almost completely built on their conference
play. Their non-con is going to hurt
them, period. The fact that the
signature wins came at home means there's work left to do. This might be a one-game season for St Joe's
- @GWU in a few weeks.
Richmond (17-8) (7-3) RPI 40 SoS 48
Vital signs: 6-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 89, 2-5 vs. Top 50, 6-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 159/43
Quality wins: UMass, St Joe's,
Dayton
Bad losses: @Wake, @St
Bonaventure, losses magnified by the fact they have no top 100 road wins
Significant home court bias in this resume, which probably means
they're on the outside right now. The
problem is they're out of road chances against better teams. No choice but to hold home court against GWU
and VCU and hope.
Dayton (17-8) (5-5) RPI 58 SoS 69
Vital signs: 8-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 89, 3-5 vs. Top 50, 6-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 151/78
Quality wins: N-Gonzaga and Cal
in Maui, GWU, @Ole Miss
Bad losses: @URI, USC, @Illinois
St is a trio of suck
Still getting a courtesy look because the wins compare favorably to
other bubble teams. If they get hot,
they can rally back to the good side of the bubble quickly.
NIT watch
St Bonaventure (15-10) (5-6) RPI 80 SoS 96
LaSalle (12-12) (4-6) RPI 92 SoS 40
No postseason
Duquesne, Rhode Island, Fordham, George Mason
Big East
Lockbox
Villanova (22-3) (10-2) RPI 5 SoS 25
Vital signs: 11-2 R/N, non-con
SoS 29, 4-3 vs. Top 50, 10-3 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 117/7
Quality wins: Kansas/Iowa in
Atlantis, @St Joe's, Xavier, G'town
Bad losses: only by eleventy
billion to Creighton
Still need to work on building profile depth to justify a 1 or 2
seed. Winning a bunch of BEast games
down the stretch will solve that issue, really.
But the Creighton trump card is going to be played against them.
Creighton (21-4) (11-2) RPI 11 SoS 33
Vital signs: 7-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 51, 6-2 vs. Top 50, 10-2 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 120/43
Quality wins: swept Villanova...N-Arizona
St, @St Joe's, Cal/Xavier/G'town, etc
Bad losses: perhaps @St John's
and Provi for protected seed chances
Obvious lock, not-so-obvious seeding case. Sweep of Villanova helps.
Bubble
Xavier (16-8) (7-5) RPI 49 SoS 52
Vital signs: 4-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 115, 1-3 vs. Top 50, 7-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 117/63
Quality wins: N-Cincy...and a
bunch of homies. Tenn, G'town, Provi, St
John's
Bad losses: N-USC, Seton Hall,
@Marq?
They're making this harder than it has to be. A brutal R/N record is going to be the issue,
and they're almost out of road chances to make an impact there. In for now, but it's getting dicey.
Georgetown (15-10) (6-7) RPI 55 SoS 23
Vital signs: 5-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 35, 3-5 vs. Top 50, 5-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 128/66
Quality wins: N-Michigan St,
N-VCU, N-Kansas St, Provi and St John's?
Bad losses: N-Northeastern,
Seton Hall and Marquette at home
Those signature wins are giving them some second chances. Outside of them, there's not a lot to get
excited about here. But we have to take
them seriously again
Providence (17-9) (7-6) RPI 56 SoS 58
Vital signs: 5-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 149, 2-4 vs. Top 50, 6-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 140/53
Quality wins: Creighton, Xavier,
G'town, @St John's
Bad losses: Seton Hall,
N-Maryland?
Bad news is they'll have to completely rely on conference play, as the
non-con contains anything of significance.
Decent home wins can only hold up the profile so much.
St John's (17-9) (7-6) RPI 57 SoS 37
Vital signs: 5-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 123, 1-5 vs. Top 50, 5-7 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 167/45
Quality wins: Creighton, @Provi,
G'town, and...
Bad losses: @DePaul, Penn St
Bad losses: @DePaul, Penn St
The win over Creighton merely gets them onto the page, not over the
bubble yet. We'll need more from them.
NIT watch
Marquette (15-10) (7-5) RPI 74 SoS 71 - I was tempted to take a
courtesy bubble look, but 4-8 R/N, 4 top 100 wins not enough despite N-GWU win
EIEIO watch
Seton Hall (13-12) (4-8) RPI 140 SoS 98
No postseason
Butler, DePaul
Big Sky
Conference championship watch
Weber St (12-7) (11-2) RPI 156 SoS 266
Northern Colorado (13-8) (9-5) RPI 165 SoS 285
In reality, Weber St has this conference on lockdown. N. Colorado has the conference's signature
win at Kansas St. Weber St actually
doesn't have a top 200 win OOC. They're
staring the 16 line in the face.
EIEIO watch
Montana (10-11) (7-7) RPI 197 SoS 251 - at the moment, they're the only
other CIT-eligible team, but check out the conference standings: N. Dakota (8-6, 2 games under .500 overall),
N. Arizona (8-6, 3 games under), E. Washington (7-7, 1 game under), Montana St
(7-7, 1 game under), Sac. St (7-7, 1 game under). What a mess.
Have fun, CIT.
No postseason
North Dakota, Northern Arizona, Eastern Washington, Montana St,
Sacramento St, Idaho St, Portland St, Southern Utah
Big South
Conference championship watch
Coastal Carolina (13-10) (9-3) RPI 221 SoS 294
VMI (11-10) (8-4) RPI 246 SoS 332
There are 5 teams on 7 wins behind this. What a mess.
High Point, Radford, Winthrop, Gardner-Webb, UNCA. And none of the top 7 own a top 100 win. Whoever prevails is going to Dayton.
EIEIO watch
Radford (14-10) (7-5) RPI 251 SoS 346
Winthrop (11-11) (7-5) RPI 214 SoS 274
No postseason
Gardner-Webb, UNC-Asheville, High Point, Campbell, Charleston Southern,
Liberty, Longwood, Presbyterian - the first two are .500 teams as of now, but I
have to prune the list somehow
Big Ten
Lockbox
Michigan St (21-5) (10-3) RPI 9 SoS 16
Vital signs: 10-2 R/N, non-con
SoS 52, 6-3 vs. Top 50, 9-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 118/26
Quality wins: N-Kentucky, Ohio
St, @Texas, @Iowa, N-Oklahoma, etc
Bad losses: Nebraska, perhaps
N-Georgetown
Pretty standard high seed resume.
2 seed for now; not much to discuss here.
Michigan (18-7) (10-3) RPI 14 SoS 8
Vital signs: 8-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 79, 6-5 vs. Top 50, 10-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 117/48
Quality wins: @Wisky, @MSU,
@Ohio St, @Minny, N-Stanford/FSU, Iowa
Bad losses: N-Charlotte, @indiana
The high end road wins erase the couple of sins. 1 seed likely out of reach, 2 definitely in
play.
Wisconsin (21-5) (8-5) RPI 7 SoS 2
Vital signs: 9-2 R/N, non-con
SoS 7, 7-3 vs. Top 50, 14-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 96/54
Quality wins: Florida, MSU, @Michigan,
N-St Louis, @Virginia, Iowa, Minny, etc (there's more)
Bad losses: Northwestern and
@Indiana don't help
They've rebounded from a lackluster stretch and are an obvious lock and
2 seed candidate.
Iowa (19-6) (8-4) RPI 27 SoS 45
Vital signs: 7-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 219, 4-6 vs. Top 50, 9-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 142/10
Quality wins: Michigan, @OSU,
Minny, N-Xavier
Bad losses: all 6 are inside the
Top 17
That non-con SoS puts them a level below the top 3 in the
conference. Still obviously a lock though,
but they need quality wins more than most to help erase previous sins.
Ohio St (20-6) (7-6) RPI 17 SoS 6
VItal signs: 6-3 R/N, non-con
SoS 42, 3-4 vs. Top 50, 11-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 111/43
Quality wins: @Wisky, @Iowa,
NDSU?
Bad losses: Penn St, @Nebraska
Were slowly getting into trouble, but the Wisky/Iowa road double
restores them to lock status. Just like
Iowa, but not like Iowa, in terms of situation.
They have many good but not great wins (NDSU, Delaware, Ohio, @Marq,
Mary, Wyo) in the non-con, which if you add them all up, do have some value.
Bubble
Minnesota (16-9) (6-7) RPI 38 SoS 4
Vital signs: 3-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 31, 3-5 vs. Top 50, 5-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 133/45
Quality wins: Wisky and OSU,
@Richmond, FSU
Bad losses: @Purdue,
Northwestern, N-Arkansas? @Nebraska
I can't imagine only 5 B1G teams, but this profile isn't home free
yet. I would suggest getting a couple
road results to help boost the profile the most. They have OSU and Michigan on the docket on
that front.
Nebraska (14-10) (6-6) RPI 68 SoS 28
Vital signs: 2-9 R/N, non-con
SoS 110, 2-7 vs. Top 50, 5-7 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 157/49
Quality wins: @Michigan St, Ohio
St, Minnesota
Bad losses: N-UAB, @Penn St,
@Purdue
I had them off the board when I started writing this, and then they
ruined everything by winning at Michigan St.
Still a lot of work left to do, but they're in play right now. 7 of their losses are top 30 losses, so it's
somewhat forgivable with a couple signature wins in tow. Still, 2-9 R/N and 2-7 vs. Top 50 are black
marks right now.
NIT watch
Indiana (14-11) (4-8) RPI 103 SoS 72 - they have to be taken off of
every board now. Home wins over Wisky
and Michigan just aren't enough
EIEIO watch
Purdue (15-10) (5-7) RPI 106 SoS 109
Illinois (14-12) (3-10) RPI 89 SoS 53
No postseason
Northwestern, Penn St - and heck, both of them can finish at .500 too
Big 12
Lockbox
Kansas (19-6) (10-2) RPI 1 SoS 1
Vital signs: 8-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 1, 10-6 vs. Top 50, 15-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 75/19
Quality wins: N-Duke and New
Mexico, sweep of Iowa St, @Oklahoma, K-State, Okla St, G'town, on and on and on
Bad losses: all inside Top 35
The #1 SoS by a ridiculous margin.
At some point, too many losses are too many losses, but they're not at
that point yet. 2 seed with 1 seed
upside. Could use some help in
mitigating road losses to good but not great competition.
Iowa St (19-5) (7-5) RPI 10 SoS 12
Vital signs: 7-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 75, 7-4 vs. Top 50, 9-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 115/24
Quality wins:
Michigan/Oklahoma/Iowa/K-State at home, @OkSt, @BYU
Bad losses: perhaps @WVU
They've defaulted to the 2nd best resume in the Big 12. Could use a better road win to help justify a
2 or 3 seed, but they're fine overall.
Texas (20-5) (9-3) RPI 22 SoS 41
Vital signs: 6-3 R/N, non-con
SoS 149, 6-5 vs. Top 50, 11-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 127/32
Quality wins: Kansas, ISU, @UNC,
K-State, OkSt
Bad losses: all are inside Top
50, can't call any of them that bad
And Texas is quickly defaulting to the #3 Big 12 team. Good wins, no bad losses, a really simple
profile to lock in. 5 or 6 seed sounds
about right.
Oklahoma (19-7) (8-5) RPI 25 SoS 17
Vital signs: 8-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 91, 6-4 vs. Top 50, 7-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 125/44
Quality wins: ISU, @Texas, swept
OSU and Baylor
Bad losses: Texas Tech, @WVU and
LaTech?
They're doing a pretty good job erasing the fact that the non-con
resume is lacking sorely. Safely in if
they avoid major issues down the stretch.
The seeding could vary greatly, though.
Kansas St (17-8) (7-5) RPI 35 SoS 19
Vital signs: 3-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 121, 6-4 vs. Top 50, 8-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 126/64
Quality wins: Kansas, Gonzaga,
Texas, Okla, GWU, OkSt, WVU, Ole Miss, all at home
Bad losses: N. Colorado,
N-Charlotte
Lost all their significant road games, win all their significant home
games. Throw out NCU and they won their
9 toughest home games. And they lost
their 7 toughest R/N games. They still
get the Oklahomas on the road...please just win one to make this easy on
everyone.
Bubble
Oklahoma St (16-9) (4-8) RPI 44 SoS 15
Vital signs: 6-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 80, 3-8 vs. Top 50, 6-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 141/34
Quality wins: Texas, N-Colorado,
Memphis, swept WVU, N-LaTech
Bad losses: @TTU, Baylor?
Welcome to the bubble. Still
some good high-end wins and many of the losses were reasonable, so they're
still in for sure. But let's not get too
crazy about them.
Baylor (14-9) (4-8) RPI 50 SoS 7
Vital signs: 4-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 33, 4-7 vs. Top 50, 5-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 147/29
Quality wins: Kentucky,
N-Colorado, Kansas St, @OSU, N-Dayton?
Bad losses: @TTU, WVU?
Still alive with the non-con wins, still need a lot of work to do. And if we're listing OSU at 4-8 in conference
play, we might as well list Baylor as well.
Their profile is kind of mediocre across the board instead of having a
glaring weakness.
West Virginia (15-11) (7-6) RPI 69 SoS 39
Vital signs: 6-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 177, 4-9 vs. Top 50, 4-9 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 162/52
Quality wins: ISU, Okla,
K-State, @Baylor
Bad losses: @VT, Purdue
They've forced their way to the bubble, but that's all. LIterally nothing in the non-con, and so many
whiffs against the Top 50 over the season.
Don't get caught up in this.
NIT watch
Texas Tech (13-12) (5-7) RPI 104 SoS 67
No postseason
TCU
Big West
Conference championship watch
UC Irvine (15-9) (8-2) RPI 118 SoS 188
UC Santa Barbara (14-7) (7-3) RPI 93 SoS 163
Hawaii (16-7) (7-4) RPI 137 SoS 221
Irvine won at Washington, UCSB won at UNLV and vs. California, Hawaii
won vs. St Mary's and N-Oregon St, so they won't be on the 16 line at
least. LBSU is also 7-4 in conference
but under .500 overall; no other school is going to be over .500.
No postseason
Long Beach St, Cal Poly, Cal St-Northridge, Cal St-Fullerton, UC Davis,
UC Riverside
Colonial
Colonial
Conference championship watch
Delaware (19-7) (11-0) RPI 63 SoS 147
Towson (16-9) (8-3) RPI 127 SoS 226
Delaware has an empty calories profile - that 63 RPI is not
representative of their real profile. No
quality wins of note. As for the
conference race, it's over.
EIEIO watch
William & Mary (14-9) (7-4) RPI 125 SoS 178
Drexel (14-11) (6-6) RPI 123 SoS 127
No postseason
Northeastern, Charleston, James Madison, Hofstra, UNC-Wilmington
CUSA
Bubble
Southern Miss (19-5) (8-3) RPI 42 SoS 143
Vital signs: 10-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 164, 1-1 vs. Top 50, 3-2 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 188/108
Quality wins: @NDSU, LaTech, Ga
St?
Bad losses: @UAB, @WKU? @Tulsa?
This is a token listing at this point.
They're off the board now.
Louisiana Tech (20-5) (9-2) RPI 78 SoS 233
Vital signs: 9-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 289, 1-2 vs. Top 50, 2-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 227/76
Quality wins: @Oklahoma, N-St
Bona?
Bad losses: UL-Lafayette, other
4 are reasonable
They're clinging to hope and are completely dependent on Oklahoma, but
a pulse is a pulse
NIT watch
UTEP (17-7) (9-2) RPI 96 SoS 137 - they did beat UT on a neutral but
that's it
Middle Tennessee (17-7) (9-2) RPI 73 SoS 126 - they did beat Southern
Miss and Akron
EIEIO watch
Tulsa (13-12) (8-3) RPI 121 SoS 93 - did beat Southern Miss and
N-Indiana St and MTSU...they've finally stopped losing a bunch of games to mask
decency in the profile
Charlotte (14-10) (5-6) RPI 141 SoS 165
UAB (13-10) (4-7) RPI 164 SoS 165
Tulane (13-12) (6-5) RPI 207 SoS 234
No postseason
Old Dominion, *Florida International, Florida Atlantic, UTSA, North
Texas, Marshall, East Carolina, Rice - ODU is actually decent and ECU is
technically still .500, but they're all out
Horizon
NIT watch
Green Bay (18-5) (11-2) RPI 64 SoS 145 - I just can't give them the
bubble spot. Virginia win can't do all
the heavy lifting
NIT watch
Cleveland St (16-10) (9-4) RPI 100 SoS 150 - emerged as the #2 Horizon
team, probably
EIEIO watch
Valparaiso (13-11) (8-4) RPI 168 SoS 197
Milwaukee (15-10) (6-6) RPI 154 SoS 229
Wright St (13-13) (7-6) RPI 225 SoS 253
No postseason
Youngstown St, Detroit, Oakland, UIC
Independents
No postseason
NJIT
Ivy
NIT watch
Harvard (19-4) (7-1) RPI 52 SoS 182 - I just can't justify a bubble
spot for them right now
EIEIO watch
Yale (12-9) (7-1) RPI 120 SoS 160 - and technically lead the conference
on the tiebreaker at this point; literally did nothing in the non-con though
Brown (12-9) (5-3) RPI 210 SoS 308
Columbia (14-10) (4-4) RPI 157 SoS 217
No postseason
Princeton, Penn, Dartmouth, Cornell - Princeton is actually 13-7 but
I'm demoting them at 2-5 in the Ivy
MAAC
Conference championship watch
Iona (17-8) (14-2) RPI 81 SoS 149
Manhattan (19-6) (12-4) RPI 82 SoS 207
Quinnipiac (17-8) (12-4) RPI 91 SoS 170
Canisius (18-8) (12-4) RPI 102 SoS 202
A pretty competitive top 4 here; Iona has created separation by a
little bit. Manhattan beat LaSalle,
Canisius > Georgia St...the MAAC usually has better high-end wins than
this. A bit of a down year for them.
EIEIO watch
Rider (13-12) (9-7) RPI 181 SoS 231
No postseason
Siena, Marist, St Peter's, Monmouth, Niagara, Fairfield
MAC
Bubble
Toledo (20-4) (9-3) RPI 31 SoS 128
Vital signs: 9-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 147, 0-1 vs. Top 50, 3-3 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 183/60
Quality wins: Ohio, @Akron,
Cleveland St?
Bad losses: @WMU
RPI of 31! Jeez, what a
misrepresentative number.
NIT watch
Ohio (17-7) (8-4) RPI 65 SoS 113 - they actually have 4 Top 100 wins
and a not-completely-hollow argument to be on the bubble
Akron (17-8) (9-3) RPI 85 SoS 162
EIEIO watch
Eastern Michigan (12-10) (7-5) RPI 67 SoS 35
Western Michigan (15-8) (9-3) RPI 107 SoS 176
Buffalo (13-8) (8-4) RPI 131 SoS 198
No postseason
Kent St, Bowling Green, Miami(OH), Northern Illinois, Central Michigan,
Ball St - KSU's still at .500 but having a bad MAC year
MEAC
Conference championship watch
North Carolina Central (17-5) (11-1) RPI 129 SoS 342
Norfolk St (11-11) (8-3) RPI 263 SoS 343
NCCU won at NC State and ODU, so they'll get mild respect in the
seeding process. The MEAC standings are
a bit scattered, NSU is my best guess as a challenger. Morgan St is 7-3 and could also chase.
EIEIO watch
Hampton (14-11) (9-4) RPI 226 SoS 318
No postseason
Morgan St, Savannah St, Coppin St, Florida A&M, South Carolina St,
North Carolina A&T, Howard, Bethune-Cookman, Delaware St, UMES
MVC
Lockbox
Wichita St (26-0) (13-0) RPI 6 SoS 92
Vital signs: 12-0 R/N, non-con
SoS 44, 2-0 vs. Top 50, 5-0 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 144/0
Quality wins: @St Louis, N-BYU,
Tennessee, swept Indiana St
Bad losses: nope
They are 12-0 against RPI teams 101-150. That's quite ridiculous. 7-0 against 101-125. This is lesson #1 why you shouldn't blindly
trust records vs. Top 50 and Top 100 when evaluating.
Bubble
Indiana St (18-6) (11-3) RPI 54 SoS 135
Vital signs: 9-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 203, 0-3 vs. Top 50, 1-4 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 203/70
Quality wins: Belmont, @UNI and
ND?
Bad losses: @SIU
Nope. Good luck finding value in
this profile.
EIEIO watch
Missouri St (16-9) (7-7) RPI 109 SoS 171
Illinois St (13-12) (7-7) RPI 138 SoS 116
Northern Iowa (12-13) (7-7) RPI 105 SoS 78
No postseason
Bradley, Southern Illinois, Evansville, Loyola(Chi) - Drake is .500 but
going nowhere, honestly
Mountain West
Lockbox
San Diego St (20-2) (11-1) RPI 20 SoS 105
Vital signs: 10-1 R/N, non-con
SoS 95, 2-1 vs. Top 50, 7-2 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 160/43
Quality wins: @Kansas,
N-Creighton, swept Boise, N-Marquette?
Bad losses: I guess we have to
count @Wyoming
The first slip-up happened. They
still should be on the 2 line, given the high-end wins. But now the season series upcoming with New
Mexico matters just a bit more. No
losses outside of that series should mean a protected seed, easily.
Bubble
New Mexico (19-5) (10-2) RPI 28 SoS 64
Vital signs: 9-3 R/N, non-con
SoS 14, 1-2 vs. Top 50, 6-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 151/51
Quality wins: Cincy, Boise? N-Marquette?
Bad losses: UNLV, NMSU
Wavered back and forth on lockbox status for them. Should be fine; a win over SDSU would really
tidy things up. It's a good thing the
Cincy win is there because there's not a lot behind it. But it did happen, so you have to give
credit.
NIT watch
UNLV (17-8) (8-4) RPI 97 SoS 131 - no non-con results to help, the one
win @New Mexico isn't enough
Wyoming (14-9) (7-5) RPI 84 SoS 106 - another close bubble call, but
there's nothing behind the SDSU win, especially from the non-con
Boise St (14-9) (6-6) RPI 62 SoS 42 - now off the bubble, the one win
over New Mexico not enough given no non-con results to help. Sense a theme here?
EIEIO watch
Fresno St (11-13) (6-7) RPI 133 SoS 83
Utah St (14-10) (5-8) RPI 111 SoS 103
Colorado St (12-12) (5-8) RPI 150 SoS 101
No postseason
Nevada, Air Force, San Jose St - Nevada has faded from their hot
conference start
Northeast
Conference championship watch
Robert Morris (16-11) (11-1) RPI 128 SoS 227
Bryant (15-10) (8-3) RPI 126 SoS 203
Robert Morris is the class, Bryant is the closest chaser, and this
conference has done little to nothing OOC.
Bryant beat Vermont and Yale, so that may help them escape Dayton.
EIEIO watch
St Francis(NY) (14-11) (6-5) RPI 165 SoS 270
Wagner (12-11) (7-4) RPI 241 SoS 336
No postseason
Mount St Mary's, St Francis(PA), Central Connecticut St, Fairleigh
Dickinson, LIU, Sacred Heart
OVC
NIT watch
Belmont (19-8) (11-2) RPI 61 SoS 134 - too many marginal losses,
otherwise @UNC might've given them life.
They're aligning for a 13 seed in March, just can't give them any better
EIEIO watch
Murray St (14-9) (11-2) RPI 152 SoS 257
Morehead St (16-9) (9-3) RPI 113 SoS 204
Eastern Kentucky (16-9) (8-5) RPI 130 SoS 239
No postseason
SIU-Edwardsville, Tennessee Tech, Eastern Illinois, Austin Peay, SE
Missouri St, Jacksonville St, Tennessee-Martin, Tennessee St
Pac-12
Lockbox
Arizona (23-2) (10-2) RPI 2 SoS 10
Vital signs: 7-2 R/N, non-con
SoS 35, 8-2 vs. Top 50, 13-2 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 106/37
Quality wins: N-Duke, @Michigan,
@UCLA, @SDSU, Colo/ASU/Ore/Stan
Bad losses: I guess @Cal and
@ASU count here
Still a clear #1 seed, just maybe not ahead of Florida now. It'll be TBD.
UCLA (20-5) (9-3) RPI 15 SoS 13
Vital signs: 5-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 74, 6-3 vs. Top 50, 9-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 118/45
Quality wins: swept Colorado,
ASU, Cal, @Oregon, Stanford
Bad losses: @Utah, @Oregon St
It's close, but I'll put them in the lockbox. The problem is all of the legwork is done in
conference play, which means no signature wins are now on this resume. That will make it difficult to get a protected
seed, but they're safely in.
Bubble
Arizona St (19-6) (8-4) RPI 29 SoS 54
Vital signs: 5-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 206, 4-4 vs. Top 50, 8-5 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 145/46
Quality wins: Arizona, Colorado,
@Cal, Oregon, Marquette?
Bad losses: N-Miami, Washington
Probably ascends to 3rd in the pecking order here. One big win changes the whole value of the
profile. I would suggest a couple of
road wins just to be sure, though.
Non-con SoS and lack of non-con results aren't helping things, either.
Colorado (19-7) (8-5) RPI 26 SoS 21
Vital signs: 4-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 38, 2-6 vs. Top 50, 9-7 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 138/34
Quality wins: Kansas, Oregon,
Harvard?
Bad losses: @Washington? N-Baylor?
Um, they need more quality wins.
Kansas makes up for quality, but they need quantity. It's still tough to imagine them missing, but
more losses will have that side effect.
California (17-8) (8-4) RPI 45 SoS 47
Vital signs: 6-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 99, 3-5 vs. Top 50, 7-7 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 142/50
Quality wins: Arizona, @Oregon,
@Stanford, N-Arkansas?
Bad losses: @USC, @UCSB, kinda
Yet another case where a signature win makes a profile go a long
way. Another team who should easily be
safe as of today, but losses can very quickly ruin this profile. Tread carefully.
Stanford (16-8) (7-5) RPI 47 SoS 37
Vital signs: 7-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 77, 4-6 vs. Top 50, 6-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 148/39
Quality wins: @UConn, ASU, @Cal,
@Oregon
Bad losses: @Washington, @Oregon
St?
Pretty good R/N record, which actually helps to forgive the two bad
road losses a bit. @UConn is their
signature win, but it's not as signature as the wins the other Pac-12 teams
have. This is another profile, less safe
than the first 3, but safe nonetheless.
Tread carefully, again.
Oregon (16-8) (4-8) RPI 46 SoS 24
Vital signs: 5-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 68, 1-6 vs. Top 50, 7-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 136/42
Quality wins: BYU, N-G'town,
@Ole Miss? ugh
Bad losses: @Washington, @Oregon
St
Barely hanging on to the bubble.
We're still looking because of the SoS but we're about done here.
NIT watch
Washington (14-12) (6-7) RPI 85 SoS 43
Utah (15-8) (6-7) RPI 93 SoS 125
Oregon St (13-11) (5-7) RPI 83 SoS 70
No postseason
Washington St, USC
Patriot
Conference championship watch
Boston (19-8) (12-2) RPI 90 SoS 189
American (15-10) (11-3) RPI 153 SoS 263
Holy Cross (16-10) (10-4) RPI 119 SoS 210
Boston won at Maryland and Quinnipiac and UC Irvine. You could do a LOT worse as an AQ team. The other contenders have done little OOC, so
everyone in the Patriot should hope for Boston to represent them.
No postseason
Army, Bucknell, Lehigh, Loyola(MD), Navy, Lafayette, Colgate - the
first 3 could still crawl over .500 to get a postseason bid or two
SEC
Lockbox
Florida (23-2) (12-0) RPI 4 SoS 22
Vital signs: 9-2 R/N, non-con
SoS 20, 5-2 vs. Top 50, 11-2 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 119/16
Quality wins: Kansas, @Kentucky,
N-Memphis, Mizzou/Tenn/Richmond at home?
oh, swept UT
Bad losses: I suppose @UConn, if
you want a 1 seed
I still wish there were more depth of quality wins here, but the SEC
has failed them in that respect. They're
pretty clearly on the 1 line, though.
It's just a question on how many can catch them (and a few can).
Kentucky (19-6) (9-3) RPI 12 SoS 5
Vital signs: 5-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 12, 2-4 vs. Top 50, 11-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 120/40
Quality wins: Louisville,
@Mizzou, Tennessee, N-Provi
Bad losses: I guess @Arkansas,
@LSU? @Baylor?
They really needed the SEC to be better to provide quality win
chances. Obviously safe for the
tournament, but they're not going to get the seed they were hoping for. I would suggest curbstomping the rest of the
SEC to be safe.
Bubble
Tennessee (14-10) (6-6) RPI 53 SoS 11
Vital signs: 4-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 40, 2-6 vs. Top 50, 6-9 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 146/48
Quality wins: Virginia,
N-Xavier, Ole Miss, @LSU? eh
Bad losses: Texas A&M,
@Vandy, N-UTEP?
Still #3 overall in profile value in the SEC, but my goodness. Things are getting dicey in this
conference. This isn't even that strong
compared to other conference, but within the SEC, it's a gold mine of profile
value. I have no idea what to do with
this entire conference as a whole.
Missouri (18-7) (6-6) RPI 39 SoS 55
Vital signs: 6-5 R/N, non-con
SoS 114, 1-2 vs. Top 50, 7-7 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 138/62
Quality wins: UCLA, @NC St? Tennessee?
WVU?
Bad losses: Georgia, N-Illinois,
@Vandy?
With the mess in this SEC bubble situation, the non-con win over UCLA
might be able to differentiate them from the rest. But given how bad this conference is, is .500
SEC play going to end up being anywhere near good enough? Nope.
Just win win win.
Arkansas (16-9) (5-7) RPI 72 SoS 66
Vital signs: 2-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 159, 3-5 vs. Top 50, 6-8 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 170/56
Quality wins: Kentucky, SMU,
N-Minny, LSU, Clemson
Bad losses: @A&M, @Georgia
They actually have enough home/neutral results to stay on the
bubble. However, that road record should
clearly identify the issue here. Get
some road wins. Get some wins in
general. There's actually time to
salvage this particular profile.
LSU (15-9) (6-6) RPI 71 SoS 76
Vital signs: 4-7 R/N, non-con
SoS 127, 3-2 vs. Top 50, 5-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 147/85
Quality wins: Kentucky,
Missouri, N-St Joe's
Bad losses: Rhode Island,
@A&M, @Bama, @Georgia
Kind of the same situation as Arkansas, instead maybe this profile is
slightly worse in the non-con. You could
argue in the ordering of Arkansas/LSU/Ole Miss in the bubble hierarchy. Putting one in over the other two would feel
like splitting hairs at this point.
Ole Miss (16-9) (7-5) RPI 70 SoS 86
Vital signs: 6-6 R/N, non-con
SoS 107, 1-3 vs. Top 50, 4-7 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 171/75
Quality wins: Mizzou, LSU, MTSU?
Bad losses: @Miss. St, @Bama,
@Georgia
This is a profile on the brink now.
Need quality wins, and in a hurry.
Chances will be there down the stretch.
NIT watch
Georgia (14-10) (8-4) RPI 95 SoS 79 - 3rd in the conference. Do they deserve a bubble look? They did nothing OOC, but have piled up wins
over teams listed in the bubble section above.
But there's way too many dents in the non-con, and no top-end win to
support this resume
Vanderbilt (14-10) (6-6) RPI 88 SoS 74 - see Georgia comments, minus the
8-4 SEC mark
EIEIO watch
Texas A&M (14-11) (5-7) RPI 136 SoS 110
No postseason
Auburn, Alabama, Mississippi St, South Carolina - a couple of these
might finish >,500, but I don't care
SoCon
Conference championship watch
Davidson (14-11) (11-1) RPI 146 SoS 179
Chattanooga (13-11) (10-2) RPI 216 SoS 317
Davidson did win N-Georgia and @Charlotte, and is the only hope for
this conference to realistically escape Dayton.
Still, this isn't your typical strong Davidson team. I could easily list Elon or Wofford in this
category as well, but Davidson probably isn't slipping.
EIEIO watch
Wofford (12-10) (9-3) RPI 179 SoS 261
Elon (13-10) (8-3) RPI 162 SoS 200
Western Carolina (12-12) (8-4) RPI 238 SoS 300
No postseason
UNC-Greensboro, Samford, Georgia Southern, Appalachian St, Furman,
Citadel
Southland
NIT watch
Stephen F Austin (22-2) (13-0) RPI 75 SoS 320 - the signature non-con
win is Towson, and the conference is bad.
Please don't get carried away, folks.
EIEIO watch
Sam Houston St (15-6) (10-3) RPI 114 SoS 259 - behind this, I'm not
projecting any other postseason teams out of this conference. TAMU-CC is 10-4 but under .500 overall. NW State is at .500, but nah. UNO and IW are ineligible. Someone could qualify for the CIT but I won't
bother.
No postseason
TAMU-CC, *Incarnate Word, Northwestern St, *New Orleans, Oral Roberts,
Nicholls St, SE Louisiana, McNeese St, Central Arkansas, *Abilene Christian,
Lamar, Houston Baptist
Summit
NIT watch
North Dakota St (17-6) (9-2) RPI 48 SoS 121 - should I list them on the
bubble? Only top 100 win is Delaware, so
no. But it's worth exploring
EIEIO watch
South Dakota St (13-10) (8-3) RPI 145 SoS 227
IPFW (16-9) (7-4) RPI 147 SoS 265
Denver (12-12) (6-4) RPI 149 SoS 122
No postseason
*Omaha, South Dakota, Western Illinois, IUPUI
SWAC
Conference championship watch
Southern (11-11) (10-2) RPI 190 SoS 254
Alabama St (11-9) (8-4) RPI 262 SoS 351
I'm not wasting my time on this conference.
No postseason
Alabama A&M, *Arkansas-Pine Bluff, Texas Southern, Prairie View
A&M, Alcorn St, Jackson St, *Mississippi Valley St, *Grambling
Sun Belt
Conference championship watch
Georgia St (15-7) (10-1) RPI 98 SoS 245
Western Kentucky (16-9) (9-4) RPI 139 SoS 205
WKU beat Southern Miss, but that's the only notable result among the
top 2 teams, or the rest of the conference, really. I think the champ will straddle the 15/16
line, unless it's Georgia St with their shiny record. However, GSU's profile is pretty marginal,
even for a Sun Belt team.
EIEIO watch
La-Lafayette (14-9) (8-5) RPI 134 SoS 222 - well they did win at LaTech
Arkansas St (14-9) (7-5) RPI 174 SoS 290
No postseason
Arkansas-Little Rock, Texas-Arlington, La-Monroe, Troy, Texas St, South
Alabama
WCC
Bubble
Gonzaga (22-4) (13-1) RPI 21 SoS 90
Vital signs: 7-4 R/N, non-con
SoS 64, 1-2 vs. Top 50, 7-3 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 142/72
Quality wins: BYU, St Mary's,
@WVU, N-Arkansas?
Bad losses: @Portland
Just look at the wins and losses.
This should be a bubble team. I
can't sugarcoat it. The good news is the
solid SoS and general bad loss avoidance, so they should be fine. But they can't have lock designation anymore.
BYU (17-10) (10-5) RPI 41 SoS 27
Vital signs: 6-9 R/N, non-con
SoS 6, 2-5 vs. Top 50, 6-6 vs. Top 100, avg W/L 139/77
Quality wins: N-Texas,
@Stanford, sweep of St Mary's
Bad losses: @LMU, @Portland,
@Pepperdine, @everywhere apparently
That non-con SoS is saving their bacon.
Those 2 quality wins can't hold everything together if they keep losing
on the road in conference play, though.
I think they're out of mulligans.
Also, the committee rewards scheduling up, so they can still go either
way on this one. One of the toughest
cases on the board.
NIT watch
St Mary's (18-8) (9-5) RPI 59 SoS 87 - just can't justify a bubble spot
at the moment
San Francisco (14-10) (9-5) RPI 87 SoS 82
EIEIO watch
Portland (15-11) (7-7) RPI 159 SoS 153
Pepperdine (13-13) (7-8) RPI 135 SoS 115
Pacific (13-11) (5-9) RPI 111 SoS 111
No postseason
San Diego, Santa Clara, Loyola Marymount
WAC
Conference championship watch
Utah Valley (13-9) (9-2) RPI 155 SOS 247
New Mexico St (19-8) (9-3) RPI 79 SoS 164
Everyone in the conference who isn't NMSU has a garbage resume, for the record. NMSU swept UTEP and won at New Mexico, so there.
No postseason
*Grand Canyon, Chicago St, Seattle, Cal St-Bakersfield, UMKC, Idaho,
Texas-Pan American - well Seattle is .500 so if the CIT needs a western team...
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