Monday, March 10, 2008

Seed List Through Sunday, March 9

A little late on my part tonight.
Drake gets their auto-bid, ending the Valley Curse. IU and Michigan St. lost to bad teams, causing a severe drop. `I take back what I said yesterday about Davidson – they may get in even if they lose to Elon. In any case, it will be close if they lose. VCU shockingly lost to W&M, so they are done. Nebraska, Oklahoma St, and Texas Tech are essentially done. However, reaching the Big XII finals should be enough for any of those three, as it would require beating either KU or UT.
As someone suggested yesterday in a comment, I considered conference records today, and that led to a little movement. As noted yesterday, the “Last Four Out” is misleading, because I don’t think that those teams have much of a chance at all.
1: UCLA, Tennessee, North Carolina, Memphis
2: Texas,
Duke, Louisville, Kansas
3: Georgetown, Stanford, Xavier, Wisconsin
4: Notre Dame, Connecticut, Drake, Butler
5: Washington St., Marquette, Southern Cal, Clemson
6: Pittsburgh, Indiana, Arizona, Oklahoma
7: Texas A&M, West Virginia, Purdue, Vanderbilt
8: Michigan St., Arizona St, Baylor, Kansas St
9: Oregon, Miami, Gonzaga, Mississippi St.
10: BYU, Syracuse, Davidson, St. Mary’s,
11: Kentucky, Villanova, Illinois St., Kent St.
12: Ohio St., Dayton, Arkansas, UNLV
13: South Alabama, George Mason, Stephen F Austin, Oral Roberts
14: Winthrop, Siena, UC-Santa Barbara, Cornell
15: New Mexico St, Portland St, UMBC, Belmont
16: Austin Peay, Morgan St, American, Sacred Heart, Alabama St.
Last Four Out: St. Joseph’s, Maryland, Texas Tech, Massachusetts

New Teams In: George Mason, Sacred Heart
Old Teams Out: Virginia Commonwealth, Robert Morris

Edit: I took out something I wrote about St. Mary's/San Diego, which I apparently wrote before the end of the game, and then forgot to edit after USD's amazing comeback.

6 comments:

N8 said...

I should have know that you are a Notre Dame fan because of your bias against all of the small schools like Gonzaga or BYU.

Anonymous said...

Vandy a 7 seed? you are out of your mind!!! RPI=10, 5 losses, beat the number one team in the country? I am glad that you guys dont have to be licensed to print this drivel.

Anonymous said...

bryce i know you mean well...but how can you justify arizona as a #6 seed ?...despite the number one schedule in america they are clearly on the inside of the bubble at best ! texas a&m as a #7 seed...wooo! obviously your s-curve system has mad a wrong turn !

Anonymous said...

I hope we can see a BYU Notre Dame match up in the tourney. the cougars would destroy them.

Anonymous said...

"Bubble teams rejoice as Gonzaga and St. Mary’s advance to the WCC finals, eliminating the opportunity for a third WCC team."

Um, comments like these don't exactly help your credibility. San Diego beat St. Mary's in the semis and Gonzaga in the finals.

Evilmonkeycma said...

1) I willingly admit that I am a Notre Dame student. This says nothing about my biases. I have spent the entire season rooting for Furman and Presbyterian. My least favorite b-ball school is Ohio St.
Since a later comment talks about BYU, I will focus on Gonzaga in this part. Gonzaga is a good team. Most of whats holding them back is the losses to USD. Those count as bad losses - in today's Colton index, USD is 115. To counter this, the Zags really only have the win over St. Mary's and the Semi-Away match against UConn (the fact that the match was in Boston means that many UConn students couldn't attend - thus the Semi-Away). Add to this the fact that Gonzaga has no representation on the committee, and I do not believe a 9 is unreasonable.
2) Even those who get paid write drivel. But if you read my comments (which is where I do most of my explaining), you'll know that I don't use the RPI, which is a mostly useless measure that even the selection committee has moved away from. I will admit (as I tend to do in such situations) that I really screwed up here - I forgot to list Tennessee on my list of key wins. If you take that away, then a 7 seed DOES fit. Expect changes in an upward direction.
3)*winces* Arizona might be too high, but I think not. People get scared by the large number of top 100 losses - 12. However, what most people don't realize is that 7 of them came against the top 25. Thats why I have Arizona higher than most. TAMU on the other hand, should be lower a seed line or two.
4) BYU - Perhaps the only team better at home than the Irish. Unfortunately, they have no meat on their resume. Sure, they have a win over Louisville on a neutral court. That came against Louisville team missing Padgett, Palacios, and Caracter. Besides that, their only other half-decent win was UNLV. Add to that 2 bad losses and a not so good loss at Wake, and I feel this is justified.
5) Wow. My bad. I don't even remember writing that sentence. It has been edited and fixed.