Bracketology 01.20.20 - Louisville Leap

Bracket Notes:
- The top seed line survived the weekend. Baylor, Gonzaga, Kansas, and SDSU all picked up wins. However, between the 2 thru 4 seed lines we saw a lot of chaos. Butler lost twice last week and fell into a 3-seed today, and also lost their position to play in St. Louis and/or Indianapolis. Louisville makes the biggest jump up after getting a colossal road win at Duke, which really polishes a resume that needed some help. Iowa snuck onto the 4-seed line after several teams above them lost over the weekend.

- Houston’s win in Wichita on Saturday put the Cougars away from the bubble-picture for now and into the meat of the bracket. They arrive today on the 8-seed line and they’ve surpassed weaker resumes like Indiana, Oklahoma, and Rutgers.

- Virginia Tech’s home loss against Syracuse puts them in the danger zone of missing the field. History tells us the Hokies poor non-conference schedule strength puts them at risk of being able to earn one of the final at-large bids. They are out as of today.

- Purdue would normally be our last team in, but we do have a bid thief for today. The Tulsa Golden Hurricane currently own the tiebreaker and would be the top-seed in the AAC Tournament if it started today. I prefer to capitalize on such scenarios to demonstrate the liklihood of a bid being stolen in March, and to learn a few things about more teams each week. So for today, congrats Tulsa and I’m sorry Purdue. Tulsa gets Memphis at home on Wednesday, so we will see if they can hang on.

We have a slew of new Conference leaders today represented below as Automatic Bids:
ACC - Florida State
AAC - Tulsa
America East - Vermont
CUSA - Western Kentucky
MAAC - Monmouth
Pac-12 - USC (See unbelievable highlights below, if you haven’t already)
Summit - North Dakota State

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Bracket projections are based on 2019-20 NCAA Committee Principles and Selection Process. Projected Conference Champions are based on projected Auto-Bid winners.

Bids Stolen: 1 (Tulsa)

FIRST FOUR TEAMS OUT: Purdue, Virginia Tech, Xavier, Washington
NEXT FOUR TEAMS OUT: Minnesota, Saint Louis, Virginia, Arizona State
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Bracketology 01.18.2020 - Weekend Primer

Bracket Notes:
- San Diego State is the final No. 1 seed, but loses its West Region route to Gonzaga in the process.  The Aztecs perfect resume is the difference for now in comparing them to Butler. They are the last remaining undefeated team and have wins away from home against: Iowa a 5-seed, Creighton a 6-seed, and BYU in position to be a 9-seed.

- Speaking of BYU, they were moved in a rare occurance down to the 10-seed line for today due to an impossible 9-seed line scenario that would’ve not met their Thursday-Saturday requirement.

- Virginia Tech has a non-conference strength of schedule that is in the mid-300’s. This will be a major issue for the Hokies as long as they stay in the hunt for an at-large bid. No team has recieved an at-large with a higher seed than a 9-seed with a 250+ NCSOS. For today, since I do think they’ve earned a spot based on current reults, we will include them and place them as a 9-seed.

- Washington slips back into the field for now after an impressive win over Oregon State. The race for these final spots is beyond complicated. The main things I am looking at for now are NCSOS, Records away from home, records against teams in or near the field, and combined Q1/Q2/Q3 records. Got all that? Okay good.

- We welcome the Manhattan Jaspers and Hartford Hawks (postgame interview below) to the field for the first time after they each took out previous conference leaders’ Quinnipiac and Stony Brook respectively. East Tennessee State is locked in as the new SoCon leader after Furman fell on Friday night at Wofford.

Bracket projections are based on 2019-20 NCAA Committee Principles and Selection Process. Projected Conference Champions are based on projected Auto-Bid winners.

Bids Stolen: 0 (Unlikely. Still rolling with zero for now.)

*-BYU bumped to 10-seed due to bracketing rules.

Bracketology 01.14.20 - Welcome to 2020!

The first official bracket projection of 2020 is here! What that means is for the first time since the preseason, all teams have been selected, seeded, and placed into the bracket using the NCAA’s policies and procedures. So here is my best personal simulation of the committee’s annual exercise based on the results that have happened to date.

Seeding Summary:
- Baylor edged out Duke with a slightly better overall body of work. The win at Kansas really tips the scales for now.
- Auburn is inching closer to the top two lines, but still needs to play and win a challenging road game (Q1) before I can guarantee that leap. The chances are coming soon.
- Villanova has emerged from a slow start to the season to creep up into the 12th overall spot, and the final 3-seed. The Wildcats now hold two elite (Quad 1A) after beating Creighton on the road. Villanova is the only team to win at Creighton this year.
- Wisconsin snuck up the list after my deep review. Badgers have three (two elite) impressive road wins, a strong strength of schedule, and the Badgers’ NET rating has them in the Top 25 for today.
- Illinois went from a bubble team to an 8-seed in a week. The Illini won at the aforementioned Wisconsin and beat Rutgers in a defensive battle. Some of this Big Ten canibalism is actually benefitial for the majority of the league.
- Charlotte is the last remaining unbeaten team in Conference USA and slips in as the final 14-seed. A projected matchup against FSU in Tampa, would be fun for the 49er fans.

Final Selections:
- Unlike previous Big Board updates, for this exercise I was able to evaluate more comprehensive Quadrant data. And comparing up to 40+ bubble resumes is not easy to do! So you’ll see a reshuffle of the teams in today’s post.
- VCU, Utah, Xavier, and NC State head to Dayton. The real surprise was Xavier here. I had them barely out last week, then they lost at home to Creighton. So why are they in?….After careful examination, the Musketeers have a 5-5 record against the top two quads, and a perfect 3-0 record in Quad 3. Thats 8-5 in the top three quads. In comparing them to the others below them, it stands out as a stronger body of work.
- Miami, USC, Washington, ETSU are the first four out of the field. Miami and USC were previously lower, they are both one quality win away from jumping in. Miami’s win at Illinois is aging well, and they are 6-5 against the Top three quads. The NET ranking at 82 needs a boost however.
- Big Ten has 11 teams in the field. And they are in quite comfortably for today.

Bracket projections are based on 2019-20 NCAA Committee Principles and Selection Process. Projected Conference Champions are based on projected Auto-Bid winners.

Bids Stolen: 0 (Highly unlikely by March, but we will roll with it for now.)

FIRST FOUR TEAMS OUT: Miami, USC, Washington, ETSU

NEXT FOUR TEAMS OUT: Virginia Tech, Tennessee, St. John's, Minnesota

FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER: @roccomiller8

2019-20 Preseason Bracketology

Bracket projections are based on 2019-20 NCAA Committee Principles and Selection Process. Projected Conference Champions are based on projected Auto-Bid winners.

Bids Stolen: 1 (New Mexico, projected to win Mountain West Auto-Bid.)

FIRST FOUR TEAMS OUT: Michigan, Marquette, Missouri, Arizona State
NEXT FOUR TEAMS OUT: Notre Dame, Syracuse, Penn State, TCU

FINAL BRACKET - Selection Sunday 03.17.19

FIRST FOUR TEAMS OUT: Creighton, Belmont, NC State, Indiana

NEXT FOUR TEAMS OUT: Alabama, UNCG, Furman, Xavier