State of the A-10
This is the big rising conference so far this year. Big leaps forward, for one team in
particular. Start thinking about 4 bids
here, folks.
UMass (10-1) was the revelation, doing it against a top 25
schedule to boot. LSU, New Mexico,
N-BYU, @Ohio...a good pocket collection of wins. And there's 3 other road/neutral wins on top
of it. This makes the @Florida St loss
moot. This profile can be good enough
for a protected seed if they win the A-10, as the conference will have more
quality win chances for them. Pay
attention carefully to this team.
VCU (10-3) have probably held at expectations so far. Losses are explainable (@UNI, N-Georgetown,
N-Florida St), and wins @Virginia and @Belmont help reduce the harm. They're not out of the woods, but a solid
A-10 season will get them in the tourney.
They'll need a bit of dominance, though, to really jump up the seeding
lines.
St Louis (10-2) is the 3rd team that should head the
conference. Losses to Wisky and Wichita
St are practically preordained. However,
the schedule was a bit unbalanced with no other wins they can truly lean
on. Kind of like VCU's situation, only a
little bit weaker.
I figure the bubble to be behind these three teams. George Washington (10-1) is the stealth
threat, but be aware the non-con SoS will languish around the 225 mark and SoS
won't break 100. Loss to Marquette hurts
more than you think, but N-Creighton and N-Maryland wins actually compare
favorably to VCU and St Louis' situations.
Dayton (9-3) did well in Maui beating Gonzaga and California while
losing to Baylor. The issue is losses
@Illinois St and N-USC aren't befitting of an NCAA tournament team. However, those wins do allow them to recover.
The next group of teams, probably aren't bubble teams right
now, but I expect one to emerge. One
typically does. Just don't ask me to
predict which one. Richmond (8-4) only
has one marginal loss (@Wake Forest) and did beat Belmont, so there's room to
make a charge. St Joseph's (6-4) only has
one marginal loss (@Temple) and did beat Drexel, so file them in the same
category. LaSalle (6-6), however, has
probably absorbed too many body blows (and potential knockout punches to Miami
and UNI among others) considering a lack of quality wins. St Bonaventure (8-4) has SoS issues and bad
road losses surrounded by no good wins.
Richmond and St Joseph's are more likely to make runs and have better
support, but I still group these 4 together saying 1 of the 4 will make a run.
The bottom 4 will be fodder.
Fordham (7-4) is probably more focused on building up wins against
inferior competition as they have (although they ruined Manhattan's profile in
the process). The bottom has fallen out
at George Mason (5-6); they have a deadly combination of SoS killers and decent
teams that they lost to. Rhode Island
(6-5) is in the typical situation of no quality wins and marginal losses. Duquesne (5-5) has a horrible schedule and
nothing resembling a win of any value.
Final prediction:
Behind the top 3, I expect a 4th team to make it. GWU over Dayton for now. We'll project Dayton to the NIT with
Richmond. Let's not the Bonnies and
LaSalle in the CBI/CIT picture.
State of the WCC
The Big 3 is now a Big 4 with Pacific. Are there enough wins to get 3 in the NCAAs? Probably not anymore.
Gonzaga (9-2) has played their usual heavyweight
schedule. The losses are a bit of a
bummer though (N-Dayton, N-Kansas St).
N-Arkansas, New Mexico St, and @West Virginia are the best wins, which
quite isn't good enough for a top seed.
They'll be fine, though. Just be
careful.
BYU (7-5) has played a legitimate heavyweight schedule, so
that 7-5 mark is better than you think.
Do you want to hold @Oregon, N-UMass, N-Wichita St, and Iowa St against
them? You can't. You can, however, about Utah. @Stanford and N-Utah St are decent wins. However, their situation would be
exponentially better if they trade one of those wins for UMass or Wichita. They do need to beat a top-end team, just
one, to feel solider. Problem is that
Gonzaga is all that's left.
St Mary's (9-2) was having a fine season until the Diamond
Head ruined it. Strong SoS, undefeated
until South Carolina and Hawaii ruined it.
They actually have a strong collection of pocket wins (Louisiana Tech,
Akron, NDSU, Drake, Boise St, the last one on the road). Such a difficult team to project. The schedule is strong, but because of
mid-majors, not high majors. Several
great wins, but they are home ones, not road ones. The committee is harsher than I'd like them
to be about these kinds of profiles.
Pacific (8-2) has emerged as a 4th power team here. At least the computers support the idea. Losses @Oregon and N-Princeton, win over
@Utah St. Probably not a serious NCAA
threat but just good enough to provide resume support to the top 3.
It's going to be a tough road for anyone else to get to .500
overall in this league. Portland (8-4)
seems like the best bet. They did beat
N-Princeton but it's the only strength of any kind in the resume. San Diego (7-4) has a similar profile, except that they lack
that top 100 win. Loyola Marymount (7-4)
is essentially a profile clone of San Diego.
San Francisco (5-5), Santa Clara (5-6), Pepperdine (6-5) all have
marginal profiles that suggest they'll be the bottom 3 teams, with no nutritional
value for the league.
Final prediction:
There isn't enough strength in the league to support 3 NCAA teams. It's a shame for BYU and St Mary's, who just
absorbed one too many blows, probably.
BYU in, St Mary's out is my call.
Pacific is a NIT bubble team, and I fear they're going to find the wrong
side of it. Them and Portland to the
CBI/CIT.
State of the Mountain West
There's no chance they could've followed up last year's
monster performance in the computers.
They are drastically down. There's
multiple bids here, but the chance of only 2 is very real now.
San Diego St (8-1) is probably co-favorites with New Mexico
now. The loss to Arizona is excusable,
and wins over Creighton and Marquette on neutrals will have value (particularly
Creighton). They'll be fine barring
significant issues in conference play.
The bigger question is seeding.
The MWC champion very well might not have the seed you'd think they
have. I think a 6 seed is the baseline,
frankly.
New Mexico (9-3) is probably the other safe team. Another sterling non-conference schedule
(8th) this year. N-UMass, N-Kansas, and
New Mexico St are excusable losses, with Cincinnati, @New Mexico St, and
N-Marquette balance it out enough.
Similar state to SDSU.
The real fun begins behind them. Boise St (8-2) is your first bubble
team. They went out and retrieved a good
non-con SoS (in the top 50) to give themselves a chance. Problem is, they got no signature wins out of
it (they whiffed the two chances to Kentucky and St Mary's). I'm not sure 1-3 against the top 2 will
provide enough value. Would the rest of
the conference provide enough value to supplement? Utah St (9-2) has a bit worse profile, with
USC representing the best win and a loss to Pacific that unfairly stings a
bit. This is a generous call to put them
in the same bubble category. UNLV (8-4)
is the enigma of the conference. SoS is
much worse than you'd think (170ish).
The loss to UCSB looks worse than it is, but when the best win is Omaha,
it hurts bigtime. Whiffed home chances
against Arizona St and Illinois are really hurting right now.
The problem is that reasonable bubble candidates end here. Wyoming (7-4) lost to reasonable opponents
(@Denver worst among them, but didn't win any games of consequence to balance
it out. Colorado St (6-4) is basically
in the same boat (hey, they lost to Denver too), but they did at least beat New
Mexico St. They have a prayer, maybe.
Fresno St (5-6) did schedule up a bit but didn't do anything
at all with it. Nevada (5-7) is in the
same situation without the schedule benefit.
San Jose St (4-6) and Air Force (4-5) have bad schedules and will hurt
the conference going forward.
No comments:
Post a Comment