Thursday, February 25, 2010

W-2.5 BP65

Believe it or not we're less than a week from the first conference tournaments. The first conference tournaments tip off on Tuesday, March 2nd. The next BP65 (and the final BP65 before conference tournaments begin) will be out soon after Saturday night's games finish)

Once again I want to remind people to stay civil and to come prepared with facts and statistics. The tone of the comments has improved greatly in recent weeks, but I won't hesitate to start deleting posts again if things degrade. Please remember to read About The BP65 to understand what the BP65 is and how teams are ordered.

For now, here's how I see things ending up:

1. KANSAS (BIG 12)
1. KENTUCKY (SEC)
1. PURDUE (BIG TEN)
1. SYRACUSE (BIG EAST)

2. DUKE (ACC)
2. Villanova
2. Kansas State
2. West Virginia

3. Ohio State
3. Wisconsin
3. Pittsburgh
3. BUTLER (HORIZON)

4. Georgetown
4. NEW MEXICO (MWC)
4. Texas
4. Wake Forest

5. Michigan State
5. Baylor
5. Tennessee
5. Maryland

6. GONZAGA (WCC)
6. Vanderbilt
6. XAVIER (ATLANTIC 10)
6. BYU

7. NORTHERN IOWA (MVC)
7. Temple
7. Missouri
7. Texas A&M

8. Oklahoma State
8. Louisville
8. Florida State
8. CALIFORNIA (PAC 10)

9. Virginia Tech
9. Illinois
9. Richmond
9. Georgia Tech

10. Florida
10. Clemson
10. UNLV
10. Saint Mary's

11. CORNELL (IVY)
11. UConn
11. UTEP
11. Dayton

12. SIENA (MAAC)
12. San Diego State
12. Cincinnati
12. MEMPHIS (CONFERENCE USA)

13. UTAH STATE (WAC)
13. OLD DOMINION (COLONIAL)
13. MURRAY STATE (OVC)
13. KENT STATE (MAC)

14. WEBER STATE (BIG SKY)
14. WOFFORD (SOUTHERN)
14. PACIFIC (BIG WEST)
14. OAKLAND (SUMMIT)

15. COASTAL CAROLINA (BIG SOUTH)
15. SAM HOUSTON STATE (SOUTHLAND)
15. VERMONT (AMERICA EAST)
15. MORGAN STATE (MEAC)

16. WESTERN KENTUCKY (SUN BELT)
16. BELMONT (ATLANTIC SUN)
16. QUINNIPIAC (NORTHEAST)
16. LEHIGH (PATRIOT)
16. JACKSON STATE (SWAC)


Other teams considered, but that just missed the cut:
Charlotte, Rhode Island, Marquette, UAB, Washington, Mississippi

Decent resumes, but not good enough:
Notre Dame, Seton Hall, Minnesota, Texas Tech, Wichita State, Arizona State, Mississippi State

Long shots, but still in the at-large discussion:
Miami (Fl), Saint Louis, South Florida, Northwestern, VCU, William & Mary, Marshall, Tulsa, Illinois State, South Carolina, Louisiana Tech

Still alive, but pretty much need a miracle:
Boston College, North Carolina, Virginia, Duquesne, St. John's, Northern Colorado, Iowa State, Oklahoma, Northeastern, Iona, Akron, Missouri State, Arizona, Washington State, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Portland, Nevada

28 comments:

DMoore said...

OK, I can see Marquette, Rhode Island and UAB on the bubble. Are the other three just there because it feels wrong to only have three other teams that even seem CLOSE to being worthy of the NCAAs? Can someone explain to me again why we should expand this to 96 teams?

Washington -- their only road/neutral win the entire year was at Stanford.

Mississippi -- lost 5 of their last 6 games, and is 5-7 in a very down year for the SEC.

Charlotte -- outside the Top 100 in the KenPom rankings, has lost their last three games, including getting crushed by Dayton (one of the last teams in).

Jeff said...

DMoore, I agree that only three of those six teams in the first category really have a good case, and that the bubble has been particularly thin this season. Although remember that we'll probably have a couple of upset automatic bids, like we've had the last few years, that will improve the quality of the bubble at least a little bit.

I do agree that 96 teams is ridiculous. We'd have to let some fairly bad teams in. Forget the "Why mess with something that's already perfect" argument that Dick Vitale always makes, I just don't like the idea of teams going 5-11 in conference and still making the NCAA Tournament.

Anonymous said...

St. Mary's, Dayton, & SDSU are in but Marquette - the fifth place team in the Big East - is out?

Moreover, how do you justify UCONN in and MU out? Although both have a very similar resume, MU did beat them on their home floor and has only lost once (to #12 Pitt) since.

Methinks someone is putting way too much stock into RPI, the most over-hyped metric by the media and most under-used metric by the selection committee. When you consider "body of work" - which the NCAA stresses - it's going to be difficult rationalizing leaving MU out of the dance at this point.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, Marquette is one of those teams he's always had out and refuses to put in. I see them as pretty comfortably in, probably as a 10 seed. They've beaten Xavier, Georgetown, and won @ UConn. More importantly, they are 9-6 in what's viewed as the toughest conference. Considering how bad the bubble is this year, it's hard to imagine a team with those wins, an 11-7 record in the Big East to be left out.

Anonymous said...

"Methinks someone is putting way too much stock into RPI, the most over-hyped metric by the media and most under-used metric by the selection committee."

Jeff has said the same things you said about the RPI, so no, that's not his reasoning.

Chris said...

Dayton still in, but Rhode Island is not? Hmmmm...I don't know about that. But then again, you didn't have URI in when they were 19-3, so I don't think they will ever make your board.

If you don't want Rhode Island in, I guess I can see it, but to have Dayton over Marquette is also unexpected.

Anonymous said...

I think Dayton over Rhode Island is understandable for a projected end of season model - although I like Marquette over both teams. Dayton's wins are better than URI - Georgia Tech, Xavier, Old Dominion vs. URI's best wins as Oklahoma St. and Dayton.

Jeff said...

Remember guys, this is a projection. As I said in another post yesterday, Dayton would not be in the Tournament if the season ended now. Also, Temple would be ahead of Xavier if the season ended now. But I think Xavier is better than Temple and is the favorite to win the A-10 tournament title. And I think Dayton will finish at least 2-1 down the stretch and will then reach the A-10 tournament semifinals, which should get them in.

As for Rhode Island, they really do remind me a lot of the 2007-08 Dayton team, which was another team that was ranked in all of the polls midseason, and that I was told I was the dumbest person on the internet for not giving them a 4 or a 5 seed. I kept them out of the bracket because I just didn't think they were that good. They ended up 8-8 in A-10 play and despite an RPI of 28th they ended up in the NIT. Ominous (though mostly irrelevant) sign: Rhode Island's RPI is also currently 28th.

A couple of weeks ago I was told that Rhode Island had to be a 5 seed. And now they've lost 3 of 4, with that one win coming over 2-24 Fordham. If the season ended now I think Rhode Island probably sneaks in as an 11 or 12 seed, but I see no reason that their slide is going to stop. On Selection Sunday, I still think that the most likely scenario for Rhode Island is in the NIT.

Anonymous said...

What's your rationale for having both UTEP and Memphis in? Sure, Memphis could win the tourney but the odds surely are against them. Wouldn't it just make sense to put them in if they happen to win the tourney?

Hubbo said...

Getting closer on New Mexico, Jeff. Thanks. What does Pittsburgh's blow-out loss due to their seeding for your next bracket? Are they now a 4? and Who moves up to take their place?

Still think Texas and Tennessee are too high and Vanderbilt and BYU are too low though.

Jeff said...

As for Marquette, the argument of "An 11-7 Big East team will probably get in" is a fairly good one, but Marquette is still 9-6. And their three remaining games are all against bubble teams desperately fighting for wins.

I watched most of that game against St. John's yesterday, as well as all of the key plays down the stretch, and Marquette should have lost that game. St. John's lost that game the way they've lost so many other big leads this season, by playing incredibly sloppy and undisciplined, and making incredibly bone-headed decisions.

I've been a supporter of Norm Roberts because I think he deserves time to turn that program around, but I couldn't help but be bothered by his lax attitude towards the antics by his players. On one key play late in the game one of his players (I can't remember who from memory at the moment) got a steal and was headed in all by himself to the basket, and tried to jump from practically the free throw line for a killer dunk, and then when he realized he was coming up short he tried to turn it into an awkward layup that rimmed out, leading to a defensive rebound and a quick reach-in foul, leading to a tv timeout. Forget that they had a kid on the floor who didn't realize that late game situations are not the time for dunk contest dunks, but Norm Roberts didn't yell at the kid, and left him on the floor when the timeout ended. If a kid tried that stunt with a Coach K or Jamie Dixon or Matt Painter, he'd have been chewed out for the length of the timeout and told to sit his butt on the bench for the next five minutes. That one moment told me a lot about the kind of program that Norm Roberts is directing there.


Not that it will be held against Marquette that their win was sloppy, but it tells me that we shouldn't put too much stock in that win for projecting future wins. If Marquette gets to 11-7 and then can win at least one Big East tournament game then I would expect them to get into the Tournament. But they're not there yet.

Jeff said...

"What's your rationale for having both UTEP and Memphis in? Sure, Memphis could win the tourney but the odds surely are against them. Wouldn't it just make sense to put them in if they happen to win the tourney?"
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I have to pick somebody to win every conference tournament, and I think too many other bracketologists are lazy in just picking the highest RPI or the best record as their conference tournament champion. I look at each individual conference (even conferences like the SWAC) to try to figure out the champion, and I just think Memphis has the best shot of anybody to win that automatic bid.

Chris said...

Jeff -- I agree with you that Rhode Island had no business being a 5 seed...but prior to the 3 game losing streak when they were 19-3, I could see them as a 7 or 8.

If URI wins out (only "tough" game is home against Charlotte) of the remaining 3, & they win an opening round A-10 tourny game against a GWU or UMass, but lose to a Richmond or Xavier in the next round, do you see them making it in. That would make them 23-6(11-5) prior to the A-10 tourny & 24-7 (12-6) thinking they go 1-1. I don't see how they couldnt make it in (barring a few upsets winning their conference titles), right?

Being a Rhody fan & not making it to the big dance for 11 years now, I can't take a 3rd straight NIT berth.

Jeff said...

Hubbo said...

Getting closer on New Mexico, Jeff. Thanks. What does Pittsburgh's blow-out loss due to their seeding for your next bracket? Are they now a 4? and Who moves up to take their place?
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I've taken Pitt's loss into account. I actually talked about the Pitt loss in another post yesterday. The fact is that they actually played pretty well in that game. I heard some idiot "analyst" on Sportscenter praise Notre Dame's defense for holding the Pitt offense to 53 points, but any true analysis has to look at offensive efficiency. If I recall off the top of my head Pitt only had something like 4 turnovers, and scored just about exactly 1 point per possession. It was below average for them, but not really that bad. Notre Dame won because they shot something like 10-for-18 behind the arc, and not because they "blew out" Pitt by any stretch of the imagination.

When you balance that loss with the win over Villanova, I think Pitt treads water for the week. Their resume looks like a 4/5 resume in a vacuum, but if you look around the nation there has just been so much carnage taking place among the teams competing for 3 and 4 seeds right now. I just can't come up with 12 teams I think should be seeded ahead of Pitt right now. And even if you can, I think Pitt is a good team that is improving and finishing well, and should improve their resume even further between now and Selection Sunday.

Jeff said...

Chris said...

If URI wins out (only "tough" game is home against Charlotte) of the remaining 3, & they win an opening round A-10 tourny game against a GWU or UMass, but lose to a Richmond or Xavier in the next round, do you see them making it in. That would make them 23-6(11-5) prior to the A-10 tourny & 24-7 (12-6) thinking they go 1-1. I don't see how they couldnt make it in (barring a few upsets winning their conference titles), right?
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If they win their final three regular season games and then an A-10 tournament game then yes, they'll get in. Although I wouldn't call those other two games as obvious wins as you would.

According to Sagarin, Rhode Island should be favored by the following spreads:

3.27 point favorite at Bonnies
6.61 point favorite vs Charlotte
5.94 point favorite at UMass

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see them fall at St. Bonaventure.

To use Pomeroy also, since I know some people prefer Pomeroy to Sagarin, he gives Rhode Island a 31% chance of winning all three games, a 45% chance of winning 2 of 3, and a 24% chance of losing at least two of the three.

Old Prospector said...

Ok, I think I understand why you think Vandy will end up a 6 seed - b/c you think they are a terrible road team and are going to lose some more before the end of the season, no? To that end, where would you put them if the season ended today? And how many losses in their last 4 SEC games (and SECT) will it take to get them a 6?

BTW, they are 4-2 on the road in the SEC, and a win at St. Mary's earlier this year. There aren't that many teams that can best that - maybe 15?

Jeff said...

If the season ended now I'd probably have Vandy as a 5 seed. It's not just that I think they'll lose another road game, but also that they're just not as good as their record would indicate. They've had a lot of close losses and benefited from quite a bit of luck. Their Pomeroy LUCK ranking is 83rd, but even worse they're also 7th in the nation in free throw percentage defense. Now maybe their fans are just really good at distracting free throw shooters, but I'm a believer that in the long run things like free throw defense work themselves out.

Old Prospector said...

I think the FTD stat is cherry-picking a bit - 83rd in the Luck category isn't that high - plenty of tourney teams above them in that one. Plus, they were quite UNlucky against UK, going 2-20 from 3 and missing a game-tying shot at the buzzer.

I'm not here to convince you, and I respect your argument. You were right on them 2 years ago, and I think you are still living off that call a little too much. You aren't far off though.

Anonymous said...

Shoulda coulda woulda. It doesn't matter. Marquette won. They shoulda beat Florida St., NC State, Nova the first time, @ West Virginia, and @ DePaul too - but of course, you fail to mention that.

So basically by projecting Marquette out, you think they are only getting to 10-8 even though they have two home games left in which they will be a 5+ favorite in. Call me crazy, but I'll go with Vegas' projections over yours.

Anonymous said...

I'm curious as to why you have Purdue further up on the s-curve than Syracuse. Every other bracketologist I've seen has Syracuse as the overall #2 or #3 seed. Syracuse has a higher RPI, higher Pomeroy, higher Sagarin, less losses, more wins. What's your reasoning?

As an aside, I do think the real debate is over whether Syracuse or Kentucky is #2 overall.

Jeff said...

Well things have obviously changed with the Robbie Hummel injury, but the answer to your question when I was putting it together is that I think Syracuse has fundamental flaws that well-coached teams can take advantage of, and I expect them to lose again. Teams have learned from what Louisville did to them.

Let's also recall the history of Syracuse basketball. They tend to succeed most when the least is expected. The few times they've been hyped like they've been hyped this season, something has always gotten messed up. They do best in the Big East and NCAA Tournaments when nobody expects anything.

Purdue is going to cruise through their final three regular season games even without Hummel, and they're still (in my opinion) the favorite to win the Big Ten tournament.

Anonymous said...

You're kidding, right?

What is Syracuse's fundamental flaw? Their defense is outstanding and is very tough for teams out of conference. Their offense is just as outstanding. Both are top 15 in efficiency and for most of the season have been top 10. They do turn the ball over a little too much.

What did Georgetown and Providence learn from Louisville? Whatever it was, it didn't work. Syracuse is a much better team than Purdue, even with Hummel, and any objective power rating system recognizes that.

Syracuse is one of the 10 best programs of all time, but you're going to knock them down a peg because they haven't always lived up to expectations? As opposed to Purdue, who wishes they've had the success Syracuse has had in the tourney.

Don't take this the wrong way, but who is your team that you root for so I can get a feel for any unconscious bias? Thanks.

Anonymous said...

Obviously a Marquette hater - all other brackets have them in (most above the last four in line), they have won 7 of their last 8, had a off game against St Johns (who has played well lately) on the ROAD but still pulled it out, they are a tough team that many teams would not want to face as a high seed...

Anonymous said...

He's from Wisconsin and has the Badgers pretty high and Marquette pretty low - so I'm guessing he's a Wisconsin fan and a Marquette hater.

Anonymous said...

Maryland on the 5 line? Are you high, young woman?

Anonymous said...

I know the Pac-10 is down (please tell me if I am reading this wrong) but only one team from PAC-10 making it?

Jeff said...

Anonymous said...

I know the Pac-10 is down (please tell me if I am reading this wrong) but only one team from PAC-10 making it?
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No, you're not reading it wrong. In fact, I've been holding out longer than most giving the Pac-10 a second bid. But right now I'm leaning towards one. Their best chance for a two-bid league is for California to lose in the Pac-10 tournament title game, because they have clearly the best resume.

Arizona State and Washington still have legitimate chances at at-large bids if they can finish strong. But I've been waiting for those two teams to get their acts together all season long and constantly been disappointed.

Washington has particularly impressed me every time I've watched them. It might just be because they've been playing bad Pac-10 teams, but just by the eyeball test I don't know how there are 50 teams better than Washington. But right now there are about 55 with better resumes, and that's too many

Anonymous said...

Memphis isn't winning the CUSA tournament this year. You would be better off just having UTEP as the lone representative of CUSA and leaving it at that. For a while you were all over Tulsa so apparently you came to your senses about that selection. Now show a little more smartness and pick UTEP to win the whole thing in CUSA. Also, you do know that UAB has a better resume than UTEP. Understand the head to head battle but UTEP's best win is against UAB.