Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Random Nerd Bracketology Update -- March 5, 2012

Update for Tuesday.

In the half-dozen-or-so years I've been playing with this, I've seen stronger bubbles. I've also seen weaker bubbles. But I can't remember a bubble this tightly-packed.

Mississippi State is back in, but barely. A win over Georgia would make me feel a lot better about them.

Colorado State is still out, but (again) barely. They have a great chance to show me something in the MWC tournament. A win over SDSU would put them in. A loss to TCU would put them out. Something in between, and they're right in the mix. I mentioned in a comment earlier that this is the sort of situation where the committee likes to send a message -- in this case, that racking up a huge RPI is not necessarily a ticket-puncher.

Deciding between Iona, Drexel, USF, and Arizona for the last spot became essentially a random draw. I went with Iona on the strength of winning their conference regular season and the fact that USF tends to "win ugly." Not that that should matter, but I've heard "style of play" too often from committee interviews to discount it completely.

Top 10 Bubble Teams: Arizona, Drexel, N. C. State, Oregon, MTSU, South Florida, Colorado State, Oral Roberts, Saint Joseph's.

Bids by conference: ACC 5, A-10 3, Big 10 7, Big East 9, Big 12 6, C-USA 2, Metro 2 (for now), Mountain West 3, Pac 12 2, SEC 5, Valley 2, West Coast 3

Don't Get Too Comfortable -- Northwestern, Washington, Harvard, Miami (FL), Southern Miss, Long Beach State


1 Kentucky North Carolina Syracuse Kansas
16 MVSU/Robert Morris Stony Brook/North Texas Norfolk State Valparaiso
8 California Alabama Gonzaga Virginia
9 Purdue Murray State Texas Notre Dame
4 Kansas State Georgetown Michigan Florida
13 South Dakota State VCU Mississippi State/Iona Seton Hall/Xavier
5 Louisville Creighton New Mexico Wichita State
12 Long Beach State Northwestern Washington Harvard
2 Duke Missouri Michigan State Ohio State
15 Lehigh Texas-Arlington Loyola (MD) UNC-Asheville
7 Iowa State Temple Florida State Saint Mary's
10 Connecticut West Virginia Cincinnati San Diego State
3 Indiana Wisconsin Baylor Marquette
14 Montana Ohio U New Mexico State Davidson
6 Memphis UNLV Vanderbilt St. Louis
11 Belmont BYU Southern Miss Miami (FL)

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