Less than 6 days to Selection Sunday, and then we will know for sure who the committee is going to put in the 2012 NCAA Basketball Tournament. A strong week for Purdue and Cincinnati has moved them from my bubble to IN status, shrinking the bubble to 10 teams. Illinois St. could have moved the bubble to nine but fell in the Missouri Valley Championship to Creighton in OT. If the Redbirds would’ve won, that would have put three teams in from the Missouri Valley. New to the party though that I haven’t looked at before is a conference champion that was upset in the conference tournaments: Iona from the MAAC.
Illinois St. almost stole a spot away from the bubble, but they fell short in OT in a hard-fought Missouri Valley Championship vs. Creighton
FINAL TEN IN
1) Washington
2) West Virginia
3) Colorado St.
4) South Florida
5) Oregon
6) Connecticut
7) Drexel/VCU Loser
8 Mississippi St.
9) Miami, FL
10) Iona
FIRST TEN OUT
1) Texas
2) Seton Hall
3) Xavier
4) N.C. St.
5) Arizona
6) Northwestern
7) St. Joseph’s
8 UCF
9) Dayton
10) Tennessee
Losing Regular Season Conference Record. Three teams I’m looking at went 8-10 in conference play: Seton Hall, Connecticut, and Northwestern. I think, like in college football, that you should at least have to go .500 in conference play. I wanted to put all three out, but Connecticut has too high of an RPI (34) and too many quality victories (Florida St., Harvard, @ South Florida, West Virginia, @ Notre Dame) to be left out of a weak bubble. But, I did put Iona in over Seton Hall and Northwestern. Iona has a lower RPI than those schools (41), and they won their conference. Against the top 6 teams of the Big Ten, Northwestern went 1-8. Against the top 7 teams in the Big East, Seton Hall went 1-6. It is a false argument to state Iona, a team ranked higher than both, couldn’t duplicate those numbers.
VCU vs. Drexel. The Colonial Athletic Association Championship game is tonight when VCU takes on Drexel. If Drexel wins, it’ll be their 20 win in a row and 25th win out of their last 26 games. No matter who wins tonight, the loser should be in the NCAA tournament. If the favored Dragons win tonight, VCU still has a strong enough resume to earn a second straight NCAA bid. VCU has moved their RPI up to 49, higher than Miami, FL, Texas, Xavier, Oregon, Mississippi St, and Seton Hall, to name a few. Drexel won their only regular season meeting 64-58 on January 8th.
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