Abbreviated Bubble Watch

Unfortunately, real life has gotten in my way and I can’t put together a full Bubble Watch this week. I’ll go through a bit of the run down.

In the ACC only North Carolina and Duke are safe and only Florida State and Virginia seem to be far enough off the bubble to not be a threat right now. There’s a huge jumbled mess in the middle and opportunity for everyone else.

In the strong Pac 10 UCLA, Washington State, Arizona, and Stanford are safe. USC is getting there as well. Oregon needs to get to .500 in conference, as does Cal. Arizona State is falling apart and may have lost their bid.

The Big 12 is taking form nicely as Kansas, Texas, Kansas State, Oklahoma, Texas A&M, and Baylor all figure to get in barring collapse. The rest of the conference is virtually dead.

The Big East is still a mess but it’s clearing up. Georgetown, Pitt, Connecticut, Marquette, Notre Dame, and Louisville are all in pretty decent shape. Syracuse is still alive after 2 straight wins. West Virginia, Seton Hall, Providence, and Villanova all need to find a way to separate themselves from each other.

In the SEC Tennessee is the only one in great shape. Vanderbilt’s RPI is great but they’re 2-4 in a poor conference. Florida’s record is good enough to be in good shape despite many nice wins. Mississippi remains in good shape but is just 3-3 in conference. Arkansas’s two straight wins are nice but they need to continue against Florida and Mississippi at home. Mississippi State stays alive due to a 5-1 conference record.

The Big 10 is bad but Michigan State, Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio State are in pretty good shape. At 7-1 in the Big 10 Purdue could get in as well.

In the A-10 Xavier is a lock and Dayton will likely be safe once they get healthty again. Rhode Island is sitting pretty and UMass just needs to maintain a decent conference record to be good too. St. Joe’s has put themselves in great shape with a strong conference start. Charlotte could get in the picture with some wins over the other potential NCAA teams in the conference.

Outside of these conferences, Drake is the only teams from the Valley currently in position and they’re in great shape. In the Mountain West UNLV and BYU currently hold the best resumes and could get in. The non-Butler teams in the Horizon now have too many losses to get in, but Butler is safe. Despite the loss to San Diego, St. Mary’s is in good shape, as is Gonzaga. Kent State is still in OK shape in the MAC but their RPI will take a beating their next 4 games against poor opposition. George Mason and VCU in the Colonial stay alive but with little margin for error. South Alabama took a loss at North Texas and although North Texas isn’t bad their margin for error just shrunk significantly. With four road games in their next six games we will soon learn more about USA. Finally, in the Summit keep an eye on Oral Roberts. They have no conference losses (and no quality wins) but if they run through the conference season undefeated they’ll get consideration.

Thursday Recap

Thursday night saw only one team dramatically improve their tournament resume. While NC State, Boston College and Arizona State all missed out on opportunities for signature wins, Cal picked up a much needed win over Washington State. The Golden Bears are still not a tournament team at this point, but this win puts them in a position to make a run at a bid. Also in the Pac-10, Arizona won on the road at USC. This win couple with Washington State's loss puts Arizona in the position to finish in 2nd place in the Pac-10.

One more game of note of Thursday night was Notre Dame's win over Providence. The win puts the Irish at 5-2 in conference with all 5 wins coming against teams rated in the top 60 of the RPI. Notre Dame appears to be in great shape and should earn a bid baring a collapse in the last month of the season. Providence, on the other hand, will need to make up a lot of ground in February if they hope to be dancing in March. The Friars sit at 3-5 in conference and convential wisdom tells us that they will need to finish at or above .500 in the Big East to earn a bid.

Thursday Preview

Thursday's games are highlighted by games that feature a bubble team going on the road to face a top-10 team. The breakdown of all these games is the same. The visiting team is on the bubble, most likely on the wrong side of the bubble at this point and a win could help propel them back to the right side of the bubble. These games include:

NC State at Duke
Boston College at North Carolina
Arizona State at UCLA

Two other games of interest tonight:

Arizona at USC - Both teams have righted the ship after struggling early in conference play. As of right now both teams would be in the tourney, so this game may just be influencing seeding come March.

Providence at Notre Dame - This is another match-up between two middle of the pack Big East teams. Providence could probably use this win a little more than Notre Dame as a loss would drop the Friars to 3-5 in the Big East.

NCAA Basketball: Wednesday Night Recap

Obviously I have to start off with K-State's win over Kansas. Not only did K-State win, but they were the better team last night. Kansas tied the game with a basket to open the second half but after that K-State scored and led rest of the way. It was a huge win for K-State but for all intents and purposes it has moved them off the bubble. So with that, on to some teams that are still battling for tourney bids.

Pitt over Villanova - Villanova is in trouble. Their 3-5 in the Big East following this loss and their RPI has dropped #59. The Wildcats will likely have get back above .500 in conference to garner an at-large bid.

Cincinnati over West Virginia - Cincinnati is proving to be the thorn in the side of tournament hopefuls from the Big East. The Bearcats will have to be very good in the Big East however to overcome their poor non-conference performance. West Virginia appears to be squarely on the bubble and this is a game that may come back to haunt them.

Mississippi over Vanderbilt - Vandy is another team that is fading after a strong start to the year. Their RPI of 14 isn't going to mean a thing if they stay below .500 in a weak SEC conference. Mississippi rebounded well after getting blown out at Mississippi State.

Arkansas over Mississippi State - Speaking of Mississippi State, they seemed to suffer a bit of a letdown after their win over Mississippi. This is a decent win for Arkansas but they will need to do a lot more to make up for losses to South Carolina and Georgia.

Northern Iowa over Illinois State - This is a bad loss for an Illinois State team that is hoping for an at-large bid. They may need to pick up a win over Drake to earn that bid now.

Drake over Creighton - This loss most likely means that Creighton will have to win the conference tournament in order to earn a tournament bid.

Syracuse over DePaul - This won't be classified as a "good" win for Syracuse but any road win in the Big East is good for a team sitting on the bubble.

Texas A&M over Texas - A&M proves that they are a very good team at home. If they can pick up a couple road wins, they won't have anything to worry about.

A Quick Preview of Wednesday's Games

I have to admit that my focus is solely on the K-State/KU game tonight and I don't have the mental capacity to even attempt to break down all the other games. But for those of you who are considering watching any basketball besides the Sunflower Showdown, here are the games that might have an impact on the bracket come March.

Texas at Texas A&M
Creighton at Drake
Vanderbilt at Mississippi
Villanova at Pitt
Mississippi State at Arkansas
Cincinnati at West Virginia
Virginia at Maryland

Tuesday College Basketball Review

Last night in a battle of the two teams in the Colonial with any shot George Mason defeated VCU at home. George Mason’s out of conference resume is better than VCU’s but VCU still has a one game lead in the conference despite last night’s result. San Diego State beat winless in conference Colorado State by one on a three with 20 seconds left. The Aztecs’ hopes would have likely died in Fort Collins with a loss. Ohio State avoided a loss at Penn State as they try to avoid our preference of a three bid year of the Big 10. Ohio avoided a bad home loss to stay alive as they beat Central Michigan. The Bobcats’ upcoming streak of 5 of 7 games on the road will dictate whether they have any shot or not. Keep an eye on Southern Illinois. After beating Evansville last night they have now won 5 of their last 7 games and the two losses were both on the road by a combined 3 points and one was in overtime. At just 11-10 overall in a relatively (compared to the last couple years) down year in the Valley they are probably dead but if they win out they could make it interesting. Then again, winning out is still unlikely for a team as poor offensively as the Salukis.

In the ACC, where virtually every game is a match-up between bubble teams, Virginia Tech used an 18 point halftime lead to beat Florida State and Wake Forest beat Miami a both home teams prevailed. This did not clear up the picture much at all, except Miami is now just 2-4 in conference and Florida State is only 2-5. At this point in the 12 team ACC Florida State is probably only ahead of Virginia on the pecking order and it’s safe to say the ACC is not getting 11 teams in. Things will not get a lot easier as their next game is hosting the Tar Heels.

Monday Night College Basketball Review

Monday, as they often are, was a pretty slow day. Connecticut kept up their hot play when Juan Palacios missed a potential game winning three in the final seconds as the Huskies escaped with victory. Connecticut would now safely be in the field and this was by no means a crippling loss for Louisville. They still sit in decent shape in the Big East. Oklahoma escaped with a narrow 3 point win over their instate rivals, Oklahoma State. The brothers Griffin combined for 35 points in the Sooner win. In the West Coast Conference Gonzaga rolled easily over Portland and St. Mary’s was knocked off by San Diego. The Toreros have some talent, particularly with Brandon Johnson, who scored 25. The Gaels 8 point loss illustrated that it’s probably a bad idea to shoot under 40% from the floor if you allow your opponent to shoot over 55%. St. Mary’s is still in good shape but they should avoid similar losses to not Gonzaga opponents just so they don’t give the committee a reason to exclude them.

As always, keep checking www.bizarrojoelunardi.com as the week progresses for more college basketball updates!

Another week of Joe Lunardi's Bracketology

The first thing that I noticed in looking at Lunardi's latest bracket is that he has included five teams from the Big 10 and only four from the ACC. And while I'm not a proponent of saying that Conference X deserves more bids than Conference Y, I have a hard time believing that the 5th best team in the Big 10 is better than the fifth best team in the ACC. The issue here is obviously that the 3rd through 10 place teams in the ACC are beating each other up while the top teams in the Big 10 are feasting on a very weak bottom half of the Big 10. I expect that at some point in the year (maybe not until the ACC tournament) a 4th and 5th place team in the ACC will distinguish themselves and both will have a better opportunity for a bid than Ohio State and Purdue. I also think that Lunardi is giving Purdue way too much credit for their win over Wisconsin. Yes it was a nice win, but in my opinion it's not enough to overcome losses to Missouri, Iowa State and Wofford. And Ohio State is still looking for a win vs. the RPI top-50. If they don't pick up a win against Michigan St., Wisconsin or Indiana; the selection committee may have a tough time justifying their inclusion in the bracket.

The next thing that stands out in Lunardi's bracket is the inclusion of both UNLV and BYU. Both teams have rather large blemishes on their resume that will likely prevent them from earning at-large bids unless they go through rest of conference play undefeated. UNLV has losses at Air Force and UC-Santa Barbara, while BYU lost at Boise State and a 29-point loss to UNLV. And neither team has a "nice" win to make up for those bad losses (the only win vs an RPI top-50 team is UNLV's win over BYU).

Other new entries in this week's bracket include: Florida, who enters the bracket after picking up a win over a fading Vanderbilt team, USC, who enters with their recent wins over UCLA and at Oregon, and Oklahoma re-enters the bracket with their win over Baylor that was highlighted with the return of Blake Griffin.

The loss to USC knocked Oregon off the board, while somehow Arizona State remains in the bracket despite back-to-back home losses to the Washington schools. Villanova is also off the board with their losses to Notre Dame and Rutgers, Boston College drops after losses to the Virginia schools, UMass was replaced by St. Joseph's, who defeated the Minutemen last week and Providence falls after losses to Seton Hall and Syracuse.

What we learned this weekend

Another weekend of college basketball and the NCAA tournament picture is slowly starting to take shape. This weekend saw some teams fall off the bubble, teams solidify thier tournament resume and some teams that are doing just enough to remain on the bubble. So what did we learn this weekend?

First, we learned that the Big 10 is bad. Well, we probably knew that before this weekend, but maybe we didn't know how bad the Big 10 is. It's quite obvious in looking at the conference, that the bottom half of the Big 10 is terrible, but supporters of conference have pointed to a solid top half (or at least 3 teams). On Saturday, the "best" team in the conference, Indiana, lost at home to a middle of the pack Big East team, UConn. Add this to the fact that another "top" Big 10 team, Michigan State, is the team that put up on 36 points at Iowa earlier in the year; and Wisconsin is the only team in the Big 10 that possess an umblemished resume deserving of a high seed in March. Now, I'm not saying that these three teams won't make the tournament (in fact there will probably be one more team included in the bracket come March: Purdue or Ohio State) but there's a great chance that there won't be a Big 10 team that receives a top 4 seed.

While the tournament picture seems to be cut and dry in the Big 10, things are a lot less clear in some of the other major conferences. In the SEC, only Tennessee has lived up to their non-conference performance. Vanderbilt looked like a top 25 team in during the non-conference, but they now sit at 2-3 in a relatively weak conference. The same can be said for Mississippi, who was also undefeated throughout their non-conference run. Meanwhile a couple of teams that seemed to be on the wrong side of the bubble picked up statement wins. Florida picked up their first win against an RPI top-50 team with their win over Vanderbilt, while Mississippi State absolutely destroyed Mississippi.

In the ACC, there's North Carolina, Duke and then everybody else. Clemson looked to have established themselves as the third best team in the conference, but their loss to Miami (FL) pulls them back into the pack. Miami kept themselves in contention with the win, but they still need to prove they can win on the road in the ACC before they can lock up an at-large bid. Rest of the conference outside of Virginia also are still in contention for an at-large bid, however how many bids the conference deserves is a big question. The ACC is the #1 rated conference in the RPI, but this is very misleading. First, the RPI is helped tremendously by the top 2 teams in the conference. Second, the conference's RPI is helped out by the fact that there is not a "terrible" team in the conference (Virginia has the lowest RPI rating at #109).

The Big East is maybe even more muddled than the ACC. The difference between the two conferences is that the Big East does not have the two potential #1 seeds at the top of the conference. However, top to bottom the Big East may be a better conference as seen by the fact that UConn, a team that may struggle to finish in the top half of the conference is capable of winning at Indiana. Georgetown is at the top of the Big East at this point, but if you're one of the three people who read our blog on a regular basis, you konw that I'm not sold on Georgetown. Pittsburgh had seemed to be positioned atop the conference as well, but their loss at home to Rutgers, along with an earlier loss at Cincinnati, may be a sign that this team will suffer without Fields and Cook. By my count eleven Big East teams are still in contention for an at-large bid (everyone but Cincinnati, DePaul, South Florida, St. John's and Rutgers) and none of those eleven have done much to distinguish themselves from the others.

Things are a little clearer in the Big 12 and Pac-10. In the Big 12, five teams (Kansas, Texas, Kansas State, Baylor and Oklahoma) have situated themselves in a good position to pick up at-large bids. Texas Tech is falling off the bubble and Missouri can barely see the bubble at this point. In the Pac-10, Arizona and USC have solidified their post-season resumes over the past week, while Arizona State dropped back-to-back home games and may face an uphill battle to pick up a bid.

Elsewhere, in the A-10 Xavier has positioned themselves firmly atop the conference while Dayton, the other team expected to contend for the A-10 title, has dropped three straight, most recently a loss at Richmond. UMass, St. Joesph's and Rhode Island are still in reach of an at-large bid, but will need solid performances from here on out to assure themselves a place in the bracket. The Missouri Valley is looking like a two-bid conference at this point (Drake and Illinois State). Everyone other team in the Valley has at least four conference losses and would need a huge streak to put themselves in contention for a bid. UNLV and BYU have kept their slim chances for earning an at-large bid alive, but neither can afford more than one or two more losses in conference if they hope to earn an at-large nod.