Of all the
storylines from this college basketball season, the biggest has to be the parity that has spread like crazy throughout the sport. Not only are there no truly dominant teams this season (sorry, Buckeye fans), road wins have become an endangered species, and two-win weeks have become cause for celebration. This parity has been great for fans across the country - anyone can beat anyone on any given night - and it's certainly made for some wild and unpredictable results. It's also made predicting the field, especially around the bubble, harder than ever before.
How hard? On Saturday and Sunday alone, 12 teams that we had on the 8-13 lines last week all lost games. For six of those teams, it was their second loss of the week. Four of those teams lost to inferior conference opponents at home. These results left us with a long list of teams that deserved to be removed from our Field of 68 - and, unfortunately, a way-too-short list of teams that were worthy of replacing them. In any other year, teams like
Gonzaga,
ODU, Butler, and Wichita State would be on the outside looking in right now. But with three extra bids to give out and parity abound in almost every conference, those teams are still hanging on to their spots in the bracket.
When the dust settled, we ended up taking five teams out of last week's bracket (
UCF, Kansas State, Miami, Colorado, and Southern Miss), and replacing them with UCLA, Richmond, Memphis,
VCU, and Oklahoma State. The big winners in the shake-up were the
Pac-10 (which is now a four-bid league for the first time all season), the A-10 (now a three-bid league), and the Colonial (now a two-bid league with
VCU in as the auto bid and
ODU clinging to an at-large). The biggest losers were the Big XII and C-USA, both of which are suffering from the same issue - their bubble teams can't seem to get out of their own way. In the Big XII, Kansas State has lost four of five, Oklahoma State has lost three of four, Colorado suddenly can't beat the league's bottom feeders, and Baylor has no big wins and terrible computer numbers. We decided to give the fifth, and for the moment final, Big XII bid to Oklahoma State over Baylor, despite the Cowboys' loss to the Bears on Saturday, because of their easier upcoming schedule and their significantly better
RPI (37 vs. 88). Baylor's upcoming schedule was too difficult (three of their next four are on the road) to give the Big XII a sixth bid. Memphis, meanwhile, has emerged as the team to beat in what has quickly become a cluttered C-USA. The conference is probably better than a one-bid league, but its problem is that
UCF and Marshall (the only teams other than Memphis with quality
OOC wins) are buried in the conference standings. Until that changes, or until a
UAB or a
UTEP pulls away from the pack, Memphis will be in the bracket as the lone C-USA representative.
Elsewhere in the bracket, there were significant changes along the 1-3 lines as well. Pittsburgh jumped up to the 1 line thanks to their win over Syracuse, Texas moved up to a 2 after their wins against Texas A&M and Kansas, and
Villanova went up to a 2 after winning at the Carrier Dome. A two-loss week knocked the Orange down to the top of the 3 line. Other notable upgrades included Florida State (from a 9 to a 6) and Xavier (from a 12 to an 8). The most notable downgrades were St. John's (from a 7 to a 10) and
Gonzaga (from an 8 to a 12). We had to make one change to avoid seeding conflicts this week - Michigan State and Tennessee swapped spots on the 7 and 8 lines.
Bracket Breakdown
Last Four InOld Dominion, Oklahoma State, Washington State, Wichita State
First Four OutBaylor, Dayton, Kansas State, Cleveland State
Next Four Out
Colorado, Colorado State, Miami (FL),
UAB"First Four" GamesOld Dominion vs. Oklahoma State, Washington State vs. Wichita State, Austin
Peay vs. Northern Colorado, Jackson State vs. Texas-San Antonio
---------------------------------------------------------------
Conference BreakdownBig East (11), Big Ten (6),
ACC (5), Big XII (5), SEC (5),
Pac-10 (4),
MWC (3), A-10 (3), Colonial (2),
MVC (2),
WCC (2)
America East - Maine
ACC - Duke, Florida State, North Carolina, Boston College, Virginia Tech
Atlantic Sun - Belmont
A-10 - Temple, Xavier, Richmond
Big East - Pittsburgh, Connecticut,
Villanova, Syracuse,
Notre Dame, Georgetown, West Virginia, Louisville, Cincinnati, St. John's, Marquette
Big Sky - Northern Colorado
Big South - Coastal Carolina
Big Ten - Ohio State, Wisconsin, Purdue, Illinois, Minnesota, Michigan State
Big XII - Kansas, Texas, Texas A&M, Missouri, Oklahoma State
Big West - Long Beach State
Colonial -
VCU, Old Dominion
Conference USA - Memphis
Horizon - Butler
Ivy - Princeton
MAAC -
FairfieldMAC - Ball State
MEAC - Hampton
MVC - Missouri State, Wichita State
MWC - San Diego State,
BYU,
UNLVNortheast - Long Island
Ohio Valley - Austin
PeayPac-10 - Washington, UCLA, Arizona, Washington State
Patriot -
BucknellSEC - Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Florida, Tennessee, Georgia
Southern - Charleston
Southland - Texas-San Antonio
Summit - Oakland
Sun Belt - Florida Atlantic
SWAC - Jackson State
WAC - Utah State
WCC - St. Mary's,
Gonzaga----------------------------------------------------------------
The Seeds
The 1sOhio State, Pittsburgh, Duke, Kansas
The 2s
Connecticut, San Diego State, Texas,
VillanovaThe 3s
Syracuse,
BYU, Kentucky, Texas A&M
The 4sMissouri,
Notre Dame, Wisconsin, Purdue
The 5s
Illinois, Georgetown, Washington, Vanderbilt
The 6s
Minnesota, West Virginia, Florida, Florida State
The 7s
Louisville, Temple,
UNLV, Michigan State
The 8s
Tennessee, Xavier, North Carolina, Cincinnati
The 9sSt. Mary's, UCLA, Georgia, Boston College
The 10s
Arizona, St. John's, Virginia Tech, Utah State
The 11s
Missouri State, Marquette, Memphis, Richmond
The 12sGonzaga,
VCU, Old Dominion vs. Oklahoma State (FF), Washington State vs. Wichita State (FF)
The 13sButler, Belmont, Princeton, Charleston
The 14sOakland, Ball State, Coastal Carolina,
FairfieldThe 15s
Long Beach State,
Bucknell, Maine, Florida Atlantic
The 16sLong Island, Hampton, Austin
Peay vs. Northern Colorado (FF), Jackson State vs. Texas-San Antonio (FF)
The Bracket (Bracket courtesy Matt Reeves)
Questions? Comments?E-mail Bracketology 101 at bracketologyblog@yahoo.com or send us a tweet at twitter.com/Bracketology101.
Questions For The Competition is a weekly column that addresses our issues with the brackets of other bracketology "experts." Today's questions are reserved for ESPN's Joe Lunardi and SI.com's Andy Glockner. Keep in mind that these questions are about each expert's most recent brackets, which were released before Monday's games.
It's pretty cliche at this point of the season to say that the bracket is fluid and even more cliche to say that the bubble is nearly impossible to figure. This week's Field of 68, though, has more turnover than any in recent memory. The changes begin at the top of the bracket, where Ohio State replaces Duke as the No. 1 overall seed, and they continued to the bubble, where a whopping five at-large bids changed hands this week. Oklahoma State, Richmond, Baylor, Dayton, and New Mexico all dropped out of the field and were replaced by Florida State, Marquette, Colorado, Xavier, and Wichita State. Southern Miss also replaces Memphis in the field as C-USA's automatic bid.
When the NCAA announced that the tournament was expanding to 68 teams, the consensus was that the change would make it easier to predict the field. That may end up being the case on Selection Sunday, but as things stand right now, the bubble is as hard to sift through and the bracket is as tough to seed as ever. Part of that difficulty is because we are still waiting for some big-name programs with big-time expectations (Michigan State, North Carolina, Kansas State, Baylor, Tennessee) to play to their full potential. The other factor is that, in a year where they are three more at-large bids to be had, there are very few standout at-large candidates from mid-major conferences. There were two mid-major casualties in this week's bracket alone in Drexel and Cleveland State.
