Korin24 wrote:

Exciting times for college basketball! The A10 is heating up, and teams are making their case for the coveted NCAA tournament spots. Gonzaga's impressive computer ranking is notable, but the absence of a quad one win keeps them on the bubble. Keep a close eye on Texas and other power programs as they navigate the challenging path to secure their spots. February promises to be a decisive month!

Gonzaga has a Quad 1 victory beating Kentucky at Kentucky.   

They do have across the board Computer rankings around 19-22 but outside of the win at Kentucky they do lack Quad 1 wins, true.   Two more Quad 1 games coming up in the next few games including another road game top 20 vs St Mary's.

Lunardi and Palm both have Gonzaga in their field via at large invites 

Last edited by The Dude (2/22/2024 4:13 pm)

Mountain West could have SIX teams this year in the tournament and the A-10 is sitting around with its thumbs up its asses.

Seriously Alum04? Last time the A-10 was a 1 bid league? Let me jar your memory. It was LAST YEAR. VCU.
It will be the same this year if Dayton wins the A-10 conf tourney.

Lunardi's updated Bracketology has Drake on the next 4 out bubble 

2-1 in Quad 1   5-2 in Quads 1 & 2 and 44 NET Drake.   If you switched the name "Drake" with any Power 5 they would be in the field.    He has Ole Miss ahead of them Ole Miss is 4-7 in Quads 1 and 2 with a computer number around 70.    Worse computer #s, worse Quad 1 and 2 results.  No problem! put the 8th SEC team in the field!  I guess if you are about 30 spots worse in a computer with worse Quad 1 and Quad 2 results then ... find something! more wins in Quad 3!   

Both of them just dropped 13-13 Xavier off their bubble at last.   Xavier lost at home to Delaware and Oakland, Quad 3 losses borderline Quad 4 losses. Has lost 13 games, is 2-9 in Quad 1.    Now, if Xaver was still in the A10 would the exact Xavier team be anywhere near a bubble with home losses to Delaware and Oakland?  They've had 11 cracks at Quad 1 and lost almost all of the games.  And yet they've spent the whole year in fields/bubble, until this week.

2 A10 teams for Lunardi (bid thief Richmond and at large invite Dayton)  as well as Palm in their updated brackets. 

The A10 had a great OOC this year and it doesn't matter, since the criteria is clearly designed to jam the Power 5s in and exclude where ever possible any other team.  Drake's league is way up this year, they are  23-5 beat Nevada a tourney team on the road, and now about 7 spots from his last team in.  

I guess you could say it was all "God's Plan" for Drake!



 

Last edited by The Dude (2/23/2024 4:41 pm)

Nevada won again, 22-6 with 5 Quad 1 wins.   16-2 in Quads 2-4.  

They are on most "last teams in"   which is puzzling, they look like a 5-8 seed if you put Power 5 next to their name.       Instead somehow everyone seems to agree they are right on the bubble. 

For The Mountain West Teams they have to basically run the table in the OOC which they all did.  Well deserving of the very large # of bids they are about to get in a few weeks time

 

Last edited by The Dude (2/24/2024 12:55 am)

Brutal bubble loss of the day: New Mexico loses at home to a team ranked near 300 in a brutal Quad 4 loss.

Filipowski seems to have been hurt during a Court Storming loss to Wake, which could spell the end of the court storming days

Ole Miss with their #74 ranking yete somehow on the bubble is blown out at home by 22-5 South Carolina 74-59

Amazing that 1 year ago we beat South Carolina. 
 

Last edited by The Dude (2/24/2024 7:56 pm)

Averting the brutal bubble loss of the night, Kansas St, blows a massive lead to a bad West Virginia team (155 NET) Quad 3  game at Home, to end up in OT

AND then wins an NCAA record 7th OT game, the all time record for OT wins in a season.

Elite 8 last  year under 1st Year Head Coach Jerome Tang, they are hanging on to the very outskirts of the bubble this year going 7 for 7 in OT!

Will Wade is 25-3 in year 1 at McNeese, they beat on the road, VCU, Michigan and UAB.  This is year under Wade, who took over a team with a 335 KenPom. They have 52 NET and 3 quality road Quad 2 wins.  
Bubble team?  Looks like a should be bubble resume to my eyes.  

Seems likely Will Wade's days at McNeese will not last long, despite his shoddy violations record he's a big time winner and great recruiter, some Power school (Michigan?) will be after him as soon as the season ends, what an incredible overnight turnaround
 

Last edited by The Dude (2/27/2024 12:20 am)

The Dude wrote:

Palm and Lunardi now have only Gonzaga in their field as  true as large bids,  
The American and A10 are listed as 2 bids only via bid thief scenarios

So in a 68 team field, they have 1 spot going to a Non Power 5/Mountain West team via a true at large bid.  1-3 providing who wins their conference tourney.

The next  8 teams that are just out, are all also Power conferences 

The 2023 Tourney had 3 Non power schools in the Elite 8, Gonzaga San Diego St and Florida Atlantic, and half of The Final 4 Field.  They were 3 of the only non power teams even in the field, and of course their success despite those odds seems meaningless to future at large consideration.  Their inclusion in the Elite 8 and Final 4 cost the sport a lot of $$$$$.   

 

It is for this reason that I don’t give a crap about the NCAA Tourney anymore. GW should focus on being competitive in the A10. If we could consistently finish top 4 in the conference, that would lead to more success in the A10 Tourney, including periodic championships that would send us to the NCAA Tourney. A team like GW hoping for an at large bid in today’s NCAA is a fools errand.

And by the way, the national sports media doesn’t consider Gonzaga to be a mid-major anymore, despite their conference.

Last edited by DC Native (2/27/2024 5:48 pm)

The Dude wrote:

DC Native wrote:

The Dude wrote:

Palm and Lunardi now have only Gonzaga in their field as  true as large bids,  
The American and A10 are listed as 2 bids only via bid thief scenarios

So in a 68 team field, they have 1 spot going to a Non Power 5/Mountain West team via a true at large bid.  1-3 providing who wins their conference tourney.

The next  8 teams that are just out, are all also Power conferences 

The 2023 Tourney had 3 Non power schools in the Elite 8, Gonzaga San Diego St and Florida Atlantic, and half of The Final 4 Field.  They were 3 of the only non power teams even in the field, and of course their success despite those odds seems meaningless to future at large consideration.  Their inclusion in the Elite 8 and Final 4 cost the sport a lot of $$$$$.   

 

It is for this reason that I don’t give a crap about the NCAA Tourney anymore. GW should focus on being competitive in the A10. If we could consistently finish top 4 in the conference, that would lead to more success in the A10 Tourney, including periodic championships that would send us to the NCAA Tourney. A team like GW hoping for an at large bid in today’s NCAA is a fools errand.

And by the way, the national sports media doesn’t consider Gonzaga to be a mid-major anymore, despite their conference.

You could really extend that to any team outside of the power five and Mountain West. For Gonzaga to even have a crack at the bubble all it took was 25 years in a row of making THE tournament which enabled them to play at Kentucky and UCLA USC Syracuse Connecticut Purdue San Diego St.

Then if you accomplish 25 years of that and win at Kentucky and UCLA USC and Syracuse you might just be the last team in the field according to the bracketologist! For every other school no matter how strong your season you can forget about at large bids. Look at the season schools like Grand canyon and Drake are having. Look how strong Richmond has been in League Play and it's not really doing much for them based upon this ridiculous criteria designed to exclude all of these programs from consideration

Speaking of the power programs Wisconsin continues to slide with a loss to a bad Indiana team tonight. Kentucky continues their rise with a road victory at Mississippi State. And the win of the night goes to unranked BYU going into Fogg and taking down number 7 Kansas!

Brutal bubble loss of the night goes to Wake Forest on the bubble fresh off their big win against Duke losing to a terrible Notre Dame team in a quad 3 loss!

Buzzer beater of the night, Lucas from behind half court beats Colorado St at the buzzer!

Steve Alford, the sport's most underrated Coach, the guy has turned around program after program. 
Another great job at Nevada

James Madison is 26-3 with top 50 Computer #s and won at Michigan State. They spent most of the year inside the top 25 poll, not a whiff of the bubble.   They just decided to get rid of all of these teams in the at large bid so they can jam in 12 more of the Big Power programs having down years.  

Last edited by The Dude (2/28/2024 1:53 am)

No team in history with a top 30 NET has ever been left out of the bracket

For many weeks one particular team with a ranking around 20 has not appeared in the bracketologist fields.

38 Virginia tech the highest ranked team NET to be left out of the field. 

Wake Forest with their mid-20s computer also by history would be in the field currently out of some brackets. Somehow these quad wins went from where you should be seeded to weather teams that should clearly the in the field should be left out.   If you are 19 NET that is a clearly should be included team even if it means they are a nine seed instead of a five seed.

Battle is pouring in the points 17 already in the first half and a pivotal bubble game Ohio State versus Nebraska

Last edited by The Dude (2/29/2024 7:28 pm)