We are just five days from Selection Sunday, but who’s counting? Me. And the selection committee, which begins its meeting Wednesday. And the teams that need some help down the stretch to hear their name called on that day.
Several of the conferences that expect multiple bids start their tournaments on Tuesday and there are some compelling story lines to watch. Before I get to that, here are a couple of reminders. Conference tournament games are no more important to the selection committee than regular season games with one exception. The committee needs to know which team is the automatic qualifier, which is decided by the tournament. Also, most conference tournament games are played on neutral courts and wins away from home carry a little more weight with the committee.
For teams on the bubble, these games can be vital. For others, it is all about seeding or trying to win to get in.
Here is a Bracketology breakdown of each conference with a chance at landing multiple bids to the NCAA Tournament tournament noting that the West Coast Conference will be a multibid league as well, with Gonzaga and Saint Mary’s playing in Tuesday night’s conference championship game.
Bracketology top seeds
Check out Palm’s bracket and full field of 68 at the Bracketology hub.
ACC
Locks to make NCAA Tournament: Clemson, Duke, Louisville
On the bubble: North Carolina
Remember the days when the ACC would routinely put half their league in the NCAA Tournament? Lately, it has been only a third of the conference. The ACC has had only five teams in the field for three straight seasons. That number may be a stretch this season.
Duke is a juggernaut, of course. The Blue Devils could be the top overall seed, but they only have seven Quad 1 wins, four of which were nonconference games. That means they are more likely the No.2 overall seed.
Clemson and Louisville have had good seasons and figure to be seeded around the bottom part of the top 25. For the Cardinals, it is an amazing turnaround from a season ago, when they were one of the worst teams in a major conference.
After that? Not much. North Carolina sits at 1-11 in Quad 1 games. Nothing screams “we’re not an NCAA Tournament team” quite like that. The Tar Heels first chance at a quad 1 game in the ACC Tournament would be a potential semifinal matchup with Duke.
Wake Forest is the third team out, but I do not see a realistic path to the field for the Demon Deacons, so I don’t even have them on the bubble.
College basketball rankings: No. 18 Saint Mary’s, Gonzaga clash once again for WCC Tournament championship
Gary Parrish
Big 12
Locks to make NCAA Tournament: Arizona, BYU, Houston, Iowa State, Kansas, Texas Tech
On the bubble: Baylor, West Virginia
Houston is on course to be a No. 1 seed for the third straight NCAA Tournament. The Cougars ran away with the conference title, winning by four games over Texas Tech. They will look to reach the Sweet 16 for the fifth straight NCAA Tournament, although they have higher aspirations than that.
The Red Raiders and Iowa State are in the hunt for top four seeds as well.
Preseason No. 1 Kansas has struggled to play at that level since the calendar turned to December, which it started with back-to-back losses to Creighton and Missouri. The Jayhawks have had only one three game winning streak since then. That was from Jan. 5-11, which was right after the first of their three home losses this season. BYU beat them 91-57 on Feb. 18, which is the worst loss ever handed to a preseason No. 1 team.
Speaking of the Cougars, BYU finished the regular season on an eight-game heater, which followed an ugly loss at Cincinnati. That stretch includes all five of the Cougars’ Quad 1 wins.
At the bubble end of the league, West Virginia has had trouble with consistency. The Mountaineers have shown they can beat the likes of Arizona and Iowa State. They also won at Kansas, but lost to four teams that are not NCAA Tournament contenders.
Baylor has suffered from a tough conference schedule, which included home-and-homes with Houston and Arizona and road games only with Texas Tech and BYU. IF the Bears miss the tournament, it will likely be because of a home loss to TCU.
Big East
Locks to make NCAA Tournament: Creighton, Marquette, St. John’s, UConn
On the bubble: Xavier
St. John’s has been one of the big stories in college basketball this season. The Red Storm won their first outright Big East title in 40 years in coach Rick Pitino’s second season. They played too soft of a schedule to be in play for a No. 1 seed, but a No. 2 seed is not out of reach.
I guess that is just one of the things that has made this a weird season for the Big East. Back-to-back champion UConn has had a pretty fair-to-middling season that sees the Huskies in the middle of the bracket. And it wasn’t just a bad start, which included a lost weekend at the Maui Invitational. They lost to Seton Hall just a couple of weeks ago. Consistency has been hard to find.
Creighton lost leading scorer Pop Isaacs early on, but still fought its way into the field, albeit in the middle of the bracket.
Marquette looked like the class of the league early, but only won four of its last ten games and will likely be seeded outside the top four.
Xavier won seven straight to finish the regular season and put itself squarely on the bubble. Most of those wins came against noncontenders, but a lot of bubble teams would have found a way to lose one or two of those.
Big Ten
Locks to make NCAA Tournament: Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Michigan State, Oregon, Purdue, UCLA, Wisconsin
Probable NCAA Tournament teams: Indiana
On the bubble: Ohio State
Michigan State was the outright conference champion in the regular season and has a shot to be a No. 1 seed, but it needs to win out and get help.
The conference could dominate the Nos. 3-5 seed lines with six teams that could possibly end up there, including Michigan, Wisconsin and last year’s national runner-up Purdue.
Indiana got hot as soon as it was announced that coach Mike Woodson would not return next season. The Hoosiers are not safely in the bracket yet, but a win over Oregon in their first round Big Ten Tournament game would seal it.
Ohio State needs to go on a bit of a run. They sit at just 17-14 overall and only 11-14 vs. the top three quadrants. That has never been rewarded with an at-large bid before. The Buckeyes have three losses to tournament non-contenders. That is also true of two of their Quad 1 wins. Suffice it to say that the game with Iowa is a must-win and the next one against Illinois likely is as well.
Mountain West
Locks to make NCAA Tournament: None.
Other probable NCAA Tournament teams: New Mexico, Utah State
On the bubble: Boise State, Colorado State, San Diego State
Last season was the best season the Mountain West has ever had and the selection committee sent them a clear message: “We are not impressed.”
Six teams did get into the field, but tournament winner New Mexico was considered a bid-stealer. Only San Diego State, which was tied among the league tournament teams for fewest Quad 1 wins and most losses, was seeded above No. 8. Four were double-digit seeds.
So you can forgive the league office if they are a little nervous this season. Regular season champ New Mexico is just 3-3 in Quad 1 and has three other losses to nontournament teams, two of which are Quad 3. Utah State is just 2-3 in Quad 1 with three Quad 2 losses. Each has a high number of Quad 2 wins though. No conference home wins are Quad 1 games. I have both of them seeded as a No. 9.
I have Boise State and San Diego State among the “last four in” the bracket. They will play each other to start the Mountain West Tournament. That is probably an elimination game.
Colorado State has made a strong run at the end of the season and I have added them to the bubble, but more likely than not, a conference championship is the Rams’ only path to the NCAA Tournament.
SEC
Locks to make NCAA Tournament: Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Kentucky, Mississippi State, Missouri, Ole Miss, Tennessee, Texas A&M
Other probable NCAA Tournament teams: Georgia, Vanderbilt
On the bubble: Arkansas, Oklahoma
What a dominant season the SEC has had. Auburn has been living as the overall No. 1 seed for most of the season, having piled up a whopping sixteen Quad 1 wins. Michigan State is second with 12, but three other SEC teams have hit double-digits already and Florida is right behind them with nine.
The Tigers will likely be the overall No. 1 seed on Selection Sunday as well. Alabama, Florida and Tennessee have all spent time on the top line of my bracket this season and are the leading contenders for the fourth No. 1 seed behind Duke and Houston. If one of them wins the SEC Tournament, that team will get it. If none of them do, Michigan State is in play.
Missouri has had a great turnaround from a year ago. Last season, the Tigers were 0-18 in conference play, but this season will find them in the bracket in the neighborhood of a top 25 seed.
Thirteen teams total are in my bracket as of this writing and things would have to go pretty sideways to get it down to 11, which is where I thought it would end up until about a week ago. Needless to say, 13 out of 16 in the tournament would be a record both in the raw number of teams from a conference and percentage of teams from a conference. The Big East had 11 of its 16 in 2011.
For Arkansas, avoiding a first loss to last-place South Carolina in the opening round of the SEC Tournament should be enough to land the Razorbacks a place in the field.
Oklahoma has a tougher task with Georgia as its opening opponent, but a win should seal the deal for them as well.
Some have said that winning the SEC tournament will be harder than winning the NCAA Tournament. I won’t go that far, but it will be a grind, especially for those teams starting on Wednesday.
Read the full article here
