Sunday, February 13, 2011

W-4 BP68

We're now four weeks from Selection Sunday. As we get closer to that day I'm starting to get some new traffic here from people who aren't familiar with what I do here and I'm starting to get some angry e-mails. For those folks - this is not a snapshot of where things are right now - this is a projection. If your team is rated far off from where you think they should be it does not necessarily mean that I'm an idiot. I might still be an idiot, but if you ask me in the comments I'll explain exactly why I rated your team where I did.

As always, here is how I see things ending up:


1. DUKE (ACC)
1. OHIO STATE (BIG TEN)
1. PITTSBURGH (BIG EAST)
1. KANSAS (BIG 12)

2. Texas
2. BYU (MWC)
2. Purdue
2. Georgetown

3. San Diego State
3. Notre Dame
3. Wisconsin
3. Louisville

4. Villanova
4. KENTUCKY (SEC)
4. Syracuse
4. North Carolina

5. Texas A&M
5. Florida
5. UConn
5 WASHINGTON (PAC-10)

6. West Virginia
6. Arizona
6. Missouri
6. Vanderbilt

7. TEMPLE (ATLANTIC 10)
7. Cincinnati
7. SAINT MARY'S (WCC)
7. UNLV

8. Marquette
8. Illinois
8. Tennessee
8. Richmond

9. Michigan State
9. Georgia
9. Baylor
9. OLD DOMINION (COLONIAL)

10. Maryland
10. Minnesota
10. Virginia Tech
10. Xavier

11. UTAH STATE (WAC)
11. Florida State
11. WICHITA STATE (MVC)
11. George Mason

12. St. John's
12. Kansas State
12. UCLA
12. MEMPHIS (CONFERENCE USA)
12. Boston College
12. Washington State

13. BELMONT (ATLANTIC SUN)
13. BUTLER (HORIZON)
13. OAKLAND (SUMMIT)
13. HARVARD (IVY)

14. CHARLESTON (SOUTHERN)
14. IONA (MAAC)
14. KENT STATE (MAC)
14. BUCKNELL (PATRIOT)

15. MURRAY STATE (OVC)
15. MONTANA (BIG SKY)
15. VERMONT (AMERICA EAST)
15. COASTAL CAROLINA (BIG SOUTH)

16. LONG BEACH STATE (BIG WEST)
16. FLORIDA ATLANTIC (SUN BELT)
16. LIU (NEC)
16. STEPHEN F AUSTIN (SOUTHLAND)
16. HAMPTON (MEAC)
16. JACKSON STATE (SWAC)

Teams seriously considered that just missed the cut:
Clemson, Duquesne, Northwestern, Oklahoma State, UAB, Cleveland State, Missouri State, Colorado State, Gonzaga

Decent resumes, but not good enough:
Miami (Fl), Dayton, Colorado, Nebraska, Drexel, VCU, Southern Miss, UTEP, Valparaiso, New Mexico, Alabama

Long shots, but still in the at-large discussion:
Rhode Island, Providence, Michigan, Penn State, Oklahoma, Hofstra, James Madison, Marshall, Northern Iowa, California, Mississippi, Portland

Still alive, but pretty much need a miracle:
Georgia Tech, NC State, Virginia, St. Bonaventure, UMass, Rutgers, Seton Hall, Indiana, Iowa, Iowa State, Texas Tech, Central Florida, Tulsa, Princeton, Fairfield, Air Force, USC, Stanford, Arkansas, Mississippi State, South Carolina

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Vandy beats a unknown but talented Bama and then rips Kentucky this week and you still have them a 6 seed? They still have a road game at Ky. that they may lose, but the rest of their schedule is manageable. I think you have them too low.

Jeff said...

I talked about them yesterday here.

I can see the argument that they're a 5 seed right now, but keep in mind that they probably have a few more losses in their future. They always are much better at home than on the road, and have four road games to go. I think they're looking at a 3-3 finish, which will probably put their Sagarin ELO_CHESS is the range of 30th. A 6 seed seems pretty fair.

Jeff said...

Let me also add that I thought Vandy was going to win their two games this week. That's why they didn't move up in my projections. Like I said, they're always very good at home, so I counted those as wins.

Anonymous said...

I'm confused on a few things in your projections:

1. How does Duke get a 1 seed with a maximum of 1 RPI top 25 win? Moreover, how do you figure Duke over Ohio St in ANY scenario. I see no way OSU loses more than the Purdue game.

2. I've been looking at that Kansas/Texas argument. Convince me that the committee will take the team with the better wins over the team who won at Phog AND won the Big 12 regular season.

3. Georgetown? A 2? Do you see them ending the season 4-1 or better?

4. I see no argument for TAMU over Vanderbilt. I peg Vandy at 12-7 vs. RPI top 100, and TAMU at 7-7. To me, that seems to land heavily in Vandy's favor.

5. Michigan St. I thought I was being generous giving them two wins the rest of the year. What do you see in the Lucious-less team that will get them above 15-14?

6. Why the gap between Marquette and St. John's? It seems to me that St. John's is clearly the better team by all metrics. At worst, there should be a one line gap in Marquette's favor.

Thank you for continuing to do this!

Jeff said...

I hope this answers your questions:

1. I do not think Duke is better than Ohio State. I don't think anybody thinks Duke is better than Ohio State other than some Duke homers. In my opinion, Ohio State and Kansas are the clear two best teams in the nation. The reason I have them at #1 is because I think they're the most likely team to earn a 1 seed. Duke has a good shot of going undefeated the rest of the way, with their only really tough game being that road game at UNC. Ohio State still has to head to Purdue and could easily fall in the Big Ten tournament.

2. The Kansas/Texas debate will come down to who wins the Big 12 tournament. I think Kansas is better and I'm picking them to win the game. If Texas wins out and wins the Big 12 tournament then there's no question they'll get a 1 seed.

3. As for Georgetown, I do think they're looking most likely at a 4-1 finish. I'm also accounting for the probability of Georgetown winning the Big East tournament, which is not insignificant. Either way, do you really think Georgetown's seeding is way off? I think they're pretty clearly a 2 or 3 seed. It's just very difficult right now to separate Georgetown from Notre Dame, Villanova and Syracuse, among others.

4. As for Texas A&M and Vanderbilt, I'm projecting a 4-2 finish for the Aggies and 3-3 for Vandy. Also, right now Vandy has more Top 100 wins, but the Top 50 wins are equal. How much credit is Vandy really going to get for beating Nebraska, Ole Miss and Alabama? Those wins just don't matter to the Selection Committee. Also, it's worth noting that Texas A&M has zero losses against teams with an RPI worse than 65th, while Vandy has two RPI 100+ losses. So all of that combined is why I give the edge to A&M.

5. As for Michigan State, I think they'll win at least three more regular season games and I think they'll win at least one game in the Big Ten tournament. I talked about Michigan State's situation pretty extensively here. The loss of Korie Lucious did hurt, but only in that their offense isn't quite as good as it once was. The reason they went into that horrible slump for a few weeks was that their defense played like crap - and that had nothing to do with Lucious leaving. I saw Michigan State play defense against Penn State like they did early in the season. If they're mentally back then I expect them to be back to nearly the form they displayed earlier in the season. People are sleeping on Michigan State.

6. Let me first say that St. John's would move up to at least an 11 seed after that win they had today over Cincinnati. I did not see that upset coming. But also, while I would agree that St. John's and Marquette have very similar resumes right now, I'm holding St. John's back for two reasons. First, the Selection Committee is going to be somewhat scared off by their record. I think a reasonable (and possibly slightly optimistic) finish for St. John's is 3-3 in the regular season and then a win in the Big East tournament. That gets them to 19-13. Let's say that they slip up and lose an extra game - now you're talking about 18-14. The Selection Committee just is not going to give a team with a record like that a good seed, no matter how many nice wins they have. Also, I think St. John's is overrated. In Big East play they are 4-1 in games decided by five points or less. Marquette, in my opinion, is clearly the better team. So I would expect down the stretch that Marquette will play better than St. John's and widen their seed advantage.

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Chris said...

You have Duquesne on the outside looking in. I have them in over Wash St right now. Do you think they need to run the table in order to get in (or maybe 5-1)?

Even with the A-10 having a slight off year, I think they will end up w/4 teams in. Temple/Xavier/Richmond/Duquesne.

Thoughts?

Jeff said...

The problem Duquesne has is the lack of a big win. They have one RPI Top 50 win and it came at home against Temple.

Duquesne is a good team, but their resume has work to go. They certainly can't afford to finish worse than 5-1 down the stretch. If they can finish 5-1 they'll most likely enter the A-10 tournament on the bubble.

Matt said...

I'm a huge MD fan, and excited to see you have them in. Where do you predict they will finish in the ACC?

Jeff said...

Right now I see Maryland with three easy games (vs NC State, vs FSU, vs Virginia) and two very difficult games (at Va Tech, at UNC). The toss-up game is a road game at Miami. I think Maryland is the slight favorite against Miami and I give them a better shot of pulling the upset of Va Tech than of falling in any of those three easy games, so 9-7 is their most likely final record.

If they finish 9-7 then they can't finish worse than 7th, although they're unlikely to get higher than 4th either. I think they need to get to 9-7 to stay in the Tournament, though. If they fall to 8-8 then they enter the ACC tournament with work left to do to get to the Tournament.