Thursday and Friday are always the biggest days of the season for the bubble, and we did get some resolution this season. The bubble shrunk, though more on the margins. The bubble is still 13 teams for 9 bids, but there are now significantly fewer teams on the periphery of the bubble - many of the teams narrowly in the Field of 68 firmed up their bids, while many of the teams just narrowly out of the Field of 68 suffered bad losses.
10 of the 13 teams on the bubble will be in action on Friday, so many of those teams are either going to earn the wins that send them Dancing or the losses that send them to the NIT.
There were no auto bids handed out, though two teams locked up at-large bids (Ohio State and Baylor) to push the number of Tournament locks up to 38.
Teams that move up a group are colored green while teams that drop a
group are colored red. Here is how the bubble stands as we head into March 14th:
Tournament locks (38 teams):
Cincinnati, Connecticut, Louisville, Duke, North Carolina, Syracuse,
Virginia, Mercer, Saint Louis, Creighton,
Villanova, Coastal Carolina, Michigan, Michigan State, Ohio State, Wisconsin, Baylor, Iowa
State, Kansas,
Oklahoma, Texas, Delaware, Milwaukee, Harvard, Manhattan, Wichita State,
New Mexico, San Diego State, Mt. St. Mary's, Eastern Kentucky, Arizona,
UCLA, American, Florida, Kentucky, Wofford, North Dakota State, Gonzaga
Automatic bids yet to be awarded (19, of which 10 are not projected to be won by teams currently locked into the Tournament):
AAC, America
East, ACC, A-10, Big East, Big Sky, Big Ten, Big 12, Big West,
CUSA, MAC, MEAC, MWC, Pac-12,
SEC, Southland, Sun Belt, SWAC, WAC
Teams that look safe (7):
Memphis, UMass, VCU,
Kansas State, Oklahoma State, Colorado, Oregon
Teams definitely in the Tournament... for now (5):
SMU, Pittsburgh, George Washington, Xavier, Iowa
The Bubble (13 teams for 9 bids):
Florida State, Dayton, Saint Joseph's, Providence, Minnesota, Nebraska, Southern Miss, Toledo, Arizona State, California,
Stanford, Tennessee, BYU
Best of the rest (8):
Clemson, Georgetown, St. John's, Louisiana Tech, Green Bay, Stephen F
Austin, Utah, Georgia
Long shots (9):
NC State, Illinois, Middle Tennessee, Boise State, UNLV, Arkansas, LSU, Mississippi, Missouri
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2 comments:
Do you think the SC win over Ark hurt or helped Tennessee? Obviously makes it more likely they win today but seems like they were in good shape anyway and takes away a chance for an additional decent win.
I doubt it matters too much. Tennessee probably just needs to win one game, so in that respect they now have a softer opponent.
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