Sunday, February 27, 2011

Va Tech Beats #1 Duke, But Beating #1 Is Overrated

Virginia Tech 64, #1 Duke 60
While Duke has on occasion gone three-happy during upsets, in this game they actually only had a 3PA/FGA of 0.35 (below their season average). But they couldn't hit a shot, and finished 4-for-20 behind the arc. What was perhaps more important, however, was Virginia Tech's offense. They only turned the ball over 5 times and came down with 14 offensive rebounds. And with such a thin team (the bench combined for zero points scored) the entire starting lineup showed up. In fact, all five starters scored in double-digits. Interestingly enough, Duke isn't really capable of taking advantage of a thin opponent. With Kyrie Irving out and Seth Curry and Miles Plumlee giving the team nothing, Duke actually spent most of the game with a six man rotation. Nolan Smith and Kyle Singler both played all 40 minutes.

This was a great win for Virginia Tech, but the mainstream media is way overstating how much it impacts Virginia Tech's resume. Dick Vitale went on a long rambling rant after this game about how if you beat the #1 team and finish above .500 in a major conference you should never get left out of the Tournament, and how Virginia Tech was now a "lock" for the Tournament. Not exactly. This is still the team's only win against the RPI Top 45, and they've got three RPI 100+ losses: Georgia Tech and Virginia (twice). Virginia Tech's RPI is 50th and their Sagarin ELO_CHESS will be up close to 40th. If the season ended now they would be in the Tournament, but they've still got work to do. One other thing Dick Vitale said was that a win over a #1 team is equal to wins over five other ranked teams. Huh? In fact, beating the #1 team at home is about as easy to do as beating the 25-30th best team in the nation on the road. I'm not trying to take away from how fun it is to be somewhere that a #1 team goes down. I've been there and it's awesome. But beating a #1 at home isn't a Tournament ticket-puncher. It's great, but it's still overrated. Virginia Tech needs at least one more win (and probably two) to lock up a Tournament bid. They will play Boston College on Tuesday, and then will play at Clemson next Saturday.

As for Duke, this loss increases to non-negligible chances their odds of winning the ACC tournament and not getting a 1 seed. They will play Clemson on Wednesday night, and then will play at North Carolina next Saturday. If they can win both of those games and then win the ACC tournament then they will get a 1 seed for sure. But if they lose one of those two remaining regular season games? Things could get interesting. Particularly since a loss to North Carolina would presumably cost them the ACC regular season title.

Baylor 58, #17 Texas A&M 51
Both of these teams went cold offensively for long stretches, particularly in the second half. Both teams shot below 40% from the field for the game. The difference in this game was the fact that Baylor has two go-to scorers (LaceDarius Dunn and Perry Jones) that both were able to hit shots in clutch moments. Texas A&M has a go-to scorer (Khris Middleton), but he had a bad day (4-for-16 from the field), and the Aggies had nobody else who could step up on the road against a team as good as Baylor. Baylor was the team that came in with more urgency, too, with so much left to do just to get themselves into the NCAA Tournament.

Baylor moves to 7-7 in Big 12 play with this win, and they now have a couple of RPI Top 50 wins (both again Texas A&M) to go with their bad losses (Texas Tech, Oklahoma and Iowa State). Both their RPI and Sagarin ELO_CHESS are still very close to 75th, but I think Baylor is on the bubble. They'd be out of the Tournament if the season ended now, but they're only one big win away, and they've got Texas coming to town next weekend. I actually think they'll win that game, honestly. The tougher game is the road game at Oklahoma State on Tuesday.

Central Florida 65, Southern Miss 64
Other than Tennessee, it's hard to think of another team more schizophrenic this year than Central Florida. This is a team that started the season 14-0 with quality wins over Florida, Miami (Fl), Marshall and Princeton - earning a spot in the Top 25. This same team proceeded to lose eight straight conference games - yes, eight straight. And since that they've come back with four wins in their last five games, including wins over UTEP, Tulsa and now Southern Miss. And the one loss in that stretch was a very respectable five point loss at UAB. Honestly, I think this is a talented team that is just young, with a young coach in his first year at the school, in a program that has no history of success, that just didn't know how to deal with success or failure and allowed a cold streak to snowball.

UCF actually has an RPI of 59th right now, although it doesn't matter. They're going to finish below .500 in Conference USA, so they're not earning an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. But they are a good team that appears to be hitting its stride at the right time - they have to be considered a sleeper in the CUSA tournament. As for Southern Miss, it's worth noting that they entered this game with an RPI near 40th and a Sagarin ELO_CHESS of 48th. With this loss that ELO_CHESS will drop out of the Top 50, and they're only 1-3 against the RPI Top 50 (the win was over UAB). They also have a bad loss to SMU. This loss doesn't end the at-large hopes of Southern Miss, but it eliminates their margin of error. They've got two regular season games left (vs UAB, at Tulsa) and I think they've got to win both of those.

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