Omnibus Bubble Watch Post
by TVP on Feb 6, 2012 11:45 PM EST
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PrintWe are planted firmly on the bubble right now, so let's use this post to keep an eye on them that needs to lose for our benefit.
First, this bracket prediction aggregator is a good site to bookmark:
http://bracketproject.50webs.com/matrix.htm
As you can see, the consensus has us as the first team out right now, though several brackets have us in. Now, here is who we need to root against, 9 seeds or below plus struggling UConn:
UConn, Kansas State, Alabama, Iowa State, Memphis, New Mexico, Notre Dame, Purdue, Cal, Saint Louis, Seton Hall, Minnesota, Cinncinnati, BYU, Washington, Xavier, Colorado State (forgive me Steven!),
And fellow bubble backsliders who "received votes" in this round
Northwestern, Dayton (sorry Arch), Arkansas, Ole Miss, Arizona, Wyoming, St. Joe's, Central Florida, Pitt,
I removed Miami and Texas given that they both count as good wins for us.
I will try to keep this updated as the season progresses.
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Monday 2/7
UConn crushed at Louisville. They will probably make the field but it’s fun to see them lose.
Texas wins by two at Texas A&M. They needed that game much like we need the GT game. It would be nice for Texas to climb into the RPI top 50, they are certainly a top 50 team in reality.
Tuesday’s games to watch:
Purdue at Ohio State at 9 on ESPN
Iowa State at Oklahoma State at 7 on ESPN2
Kansas State hosts Texas Tech at 8
Alabama visits Auburn at 9 on ESPNU
We Beat Miami in Miami
Cant see them in and us out right now..
Head to head results
have been shown to not correlate to NCAA bids.
by PACKHOOLIGAN on Feb 7, 2012 11:12 AM EST up reply actions
Maybe true...
…but I’ll be somewhat seriously pissed if both Miami and Texas make it in and we beat them both. Especially if we finish ahead of Miami in the ACC.
Oh, I agree
but you probably won’t be as pissed as the VT fans when VT finished ahead of unc in the acc, swept them, and still saw unc given a bid while they were relegated to the NIT.
Your Grimey jokes are getting a little Hokie.
by PackMentality on Feb 7, 2012 4:28 PM EST up reply actions
great post
gives me something to keep up with inbetween stressing over state games.
also i hate to doomcry but im forseeing a big problem for us in VT. ive watched a decent amount of vt this year and they really are a mystery. its a good team that just isnt able to win games. with their atrocious record they are a horrible pitfall for any team to fall into, and with it being the last game of the season AT vt, which is nothing like being at BC, for example, I am afraid this could be a costly loss for the pack
by TheStrengthoftheWolf on Feb 7, 2012 2:56 PM EST reply actions
VT is strange
They can look very good for stretches but then appear to be competing in the laff-a-lympics for large portions of their games. I’m hoping they are a crushed team by that point in the season and just mail it in. Most likely, Dorenzo Hudson drops in 6 threes on us, Victor Davila goes for 12 and 12 and we lose by 8.
Tuesday 2/8
Purdue loses a close one at Ohio State. That would have solidified their bid.
Iowa State loses at Okie State. Not a deal breaker for them (they still have the Kansas win).
Alabama and Kansas State both beat bad opponents easily.
Today’s Watch:
Cincy goes to St. John’s, 7 PM on ESPNU. A loss would hurt Cincy badly. They have a terrible RPI number (in the 90s) and a bad loss to Presbyterian, yet are still in many brackets.
Pitt plays at South Florida in a must-win game for them, 7 PM
Arkansas goes to UGa, another must-win, at 8
Saint Louis plays at St. Joe’s at 8:30 in a double-bubble game
Seton Hall goes to Rutgers at 9, ESPN2
At the same time on ESPNU, Notre Dame visits WVU. A win there would really help ND.
In less interesting games,
Memphis visits our friends from Greenville at 7 PM
UCF hosts Marshall at 7
Xavier hosts Rhode Island at 7 in what should be an easy win for the Mack.
by TVP on Feb 8, 2012 12:43 PM EST reply actions 1 recs
Update
Pitt and Arkansas both lost handily. Those losses put both teams on life support.
St. Louis won at St. Joe’s, who now may slide off the bubble.
All other bubble teams won.
Games to watch tonight, besides our game of course (bubble teams in bold):
Ole Miss at ranked Miss State at 7 on ESPN2
Ranked Wisconsin at Minnesota at 7 on ESPN
Utah at Arizona State…oh wait. Nevermind.
Colorado at Arizona on ESPN at 9 (and Colorado could start getting consideration if they win)
Iowa at Northwestern on ESPNU at 9
VT at Miami, ESPN2 at 9
Cal at USC, 10:30
Washington at Oregon, 11
by TVP on Feb 9, 2012 9:38 AM EST up reply actions 1 recs
Is Ole Miss/Minney
really on the bubble? Both those teams are awful in the 2-3 games I’ve seen them play. I’m pretty sure the Dook Women’s team could beat Ole Miss. I think we could put the entire Pac-12 on the bubble… what a God-forsaken conference that is this year.
Saturday
Question – should I keep updating this post or do a new one every week so it does not slide off the page?
Ton of games to watch
DePaul at Notre Dame at 12 on ESPN3
UConn v. Syracuse at 1 on CBS
Miami at FSU at 1 on ESPN3. Tough to tell who we should pull for in that one.
Dayton at Fordham at 1
South Carolina at Arkansas at 1:30 on ESPN3
Kansas State at Texas at 2 on ESPN. A win probably puts Texas in the RPI top 50, giving us another top 50 win.
Utah at Arizona at 2
St. Louis at LaSalle at 2
Cincy at Marquette at 3 on ESPNU, definitely want a Marquette win.
Wyoming at New Mexico at 3:30. New Mexico win is probably better.
Cal at UCLA at 4
Texas A&M at Iowa State at 4 on ESPN3.
UCF at Southern Miss at 5
Pepperdine at BYU at 6
Alabama at LSU at 7 on ESPN2
Auburn at Ole Miss at 7 on ESPN3
UMass at St. Joseph’s at 7
Xavier at Temple at 9 on ESPN2
by TVP on Feb 11, 2012 12:02 PM EST reply actions 1 recs
Whatever you choose. I've enjoyed it.
If you disagree with my opinion, I will take it personal and hate you forever.
by Panthers FTW on Feb 11, 2012 1:24 PM EST up reply actions
I think Steven can pin it at the top of the list as a recommended post.
by non_sequitur on Feb 11, 2012 3:32 PM EST up reply actions
Saturday Recap
Almost a big day: Notre Dame, Dayton, and Arizona narrowly avoided upsets to bad teams, but each ended up pulling it out.
Otherwise, things basically went to form, with bubble teams winning the games they should win and losing the games they should lose.
A few results of particular note:
Texas beat Kansas State. A bit of a double-edged sword: Texas is now in the RPI top 50, but Texas and K-State may both be creeping ahead of us in the bubble pecking order.
Alabama did lose to LSU after three players were suspended indefinitely. They are safe for now but if those players stay out and Alabama keeps losing, they could be in trouble.
Wyoming lost to New Mexico 48-38. Hopefully that pushes Wyoming off the bubble.
One Big Omission
How I missed this, I have no clue, but the Fightin’ Tim Miles’s of Colorado State also played yesterday…and LOST at TCU.
Gaudy RPI aside (27 right now) I think the Rams would be out if the tournament started today. Other than a home win over San Diego State they have little to hang their hats on, they are only 4-4 in the MWC, and their road record is terrible (granted, almost all road games were against decent to good competition).
Alabama
Suspends 3 players indefinitely and lose to Arkansas today. If the suspensions are for more than this one game, their bubble is probably burst.
Also, UConn and WVU both lost. Are they on life support now? I never know with Big East teams. It never seems to matter what their records are.
UConn and WVU were in the RPI top 30 at the start of the week
We’ll have to see how the losses affect them. Probably not much. They’re still in for now.
Alabama came into the week at #31, and Arkansas can work its way onto the bubble, so that’s a wash.
Sunday
Only three games of note:
Pitt at Seton Hall (12 PM, ESPN3) and Northwestern at Purdue (6 PM, Big 10 Network) are both double-bubble games featuring four teams with losing conference records. If the season ended today, I think Seton Hall and NW would be in, Pitt would be out, and Purdue would be sweating. All 4 teams need to win very badly.
Finally, Washington plays at Oregon State (5:30 PM). Washington cannot afford another bad loss.
Seton Hall, Purdue, and Washington all win
Washington will be an interesting test case if things continue as they are. They could easily end up 14-4 or so in the Pac-12 without a single RPI top 50 win.
I think Pitt can be safely ignored going forward.
General Bubble Thoughts
VAWolf82 at Statefansnation did a great breakdown of at-large selections a few years ago, found here:
http://www.statefansnation.com/index.php/archives/2009/03/06/bubble-review/
One takeaway is that you can pretty easily divide up the bubble based on RPI. A BCS-league team with a top 40 RPI is very unlikely to be left out of the tournament. This is even more true now with three extra at-large bids. The article is from before the 2009 tournament – I checked the past three tournaments and the result holds true. The highest rated BCS team to be left home was ranked 46, 50, and 49 in 2009, 10, and 11, respectively. Conversely, the lowest rated at-large team each year was 54, 57, and 69. USC last year (69) had the worst RPI of any BCS team to make it as an at-large going back to 1999.
Based on that, if the season ended today then I think Miami and Northwestern would be in comfortably, as would Seton Hall. I also think Cincinnati with its 89 RPI would be left at home. Our current RPI is 50 and thus we sit squarely on the bubble.
The Casey Kasem Theorem.
I don’t think it’s unrealistic to think that we could be a perennial top 40 RPI program. It would sure beat sweating it out through the ACC tournament every year.
by non_sequitur on Feb 12, 2012 3:03 PM EST up reply actions
Looks like our RPI will go to 50 after last week's games
with Texas moving up to 48 after their wins over Texas A&M and Kansas State, giving us 2 top 50 wins now. Should also get a nice bump over this final stretch with 4 of our 6 opponents being in the top 35. 5 of our 7 losses have come to teams with current RPI’s of 37 or higher.
Monday
FYI – I am dropping St. Joe’s and Pitt from my watch list for now.
Iowa State visits Baylor and Kansas State hosts Kansas, both at 7. Wins by the States would go a long way towards solidifying their spots.
K State in particular may need this one – they follow this game with trips to Baylor and Mizzou. Lose those three and they will sit at 6-9 in the conference.
Tough 3 game stretch for K-State
I thought Duke, FSU, UNC was going to be hard
ISU and KState
both dropped games last night. KState probably had a real chance to pull out the W, but Iowa State got run out of the gym in the final 10 mins of the second.
Still don’t think Iowa State is a tourney team, but they have something we don’t, a quality win over a ranked opponent.
Tuesday Feb. 14
Watch ESPN for these two:
Alabama hosts Florida at 7
Minnesota hosts Ohio State at 9
In addition,
Seton Hall hosts St. John’s at 7
Texas plays at Oklahoma at 8 (again, I think it’s marginally better for us for Texas to win even though they are on the bubble).
Update
Bama loses and Minnesota looks to be on its way to a loss. Seton Hall and Texas win.
In other news, Virginia loses at Clemson, and I am officially moving them to the bubble. That should put UVa’s RPI into the mid-40s, they have a few bad losses and not many big wins, and with a tough schedule to close out the season I could easily see them finish at 8-8 and REALLY be sweating.
UVa losing is great for State – we now are 1.5 games up on UVa in the race for the 4th spot and a first round bye in the ACC tournament.
Dropping Mississippi State to the bubble
RPI down to 48 after a loss at LSU. RPI down to 48. No awful losses and some decent wins, but they would be well advised to stop losing to lower-tier SEC teams.
rpiforecast.com
Just found this website. It projects end-of-season RPIs for any given end of season record. Here is where the Pack stands:
24-7 23.7 0.30%
23-8 29.2 3.29%
22-9 36.7 14.65%
21-10 46.4 29.22%
20-11 57.6 31.87%
19-12 69.8 17.11%
18-13 82.9 3.55%
Who knows how accurate this is, but taking it at face value, it confirms what I have been thinking: a 10-6 record (which this projects with an RPI of 46) would put us right in the bubble mix.
Cool concept.
All things continue to point to needing 11 conference wins to feel confident.
by non_sequitur on Feb 14, 2012 11:22 PM EST up reply actions
Tuesday, Feb. 15
Busy day.
Northwestern at Indiana, 6:30
DePaul at UConn, 7
Rutgers at Notre Dame, 7 (though ND is getting very close to safe status).
Charlotte at Dayton, 7
UNC at Miami, 8
Richmond at St. Louis, 8
Arkansas at Tennessee, 8
Air Force at Wyoming, 8
Purdue at Illinois, 8
Providence at Cincy, 9
Colorado State at Boise State, 10
New Mexico at San Diego State, 10:30
I see UNC-Miami and Purdue-Illinois as the most interesting games. Arkansas v. Tenn is also interesting – Arkansas desperately needs a road win of some sort, but UT is playing better lately.
update before I go to bed
Northwestern came close but could not pull out the win at IU. They now sit at 5-8 in the B1G and, top 50 RPI aside, I think they are in trouble.
Purdue beat Illinois. Purdue is in good shape now, Illinois in serious trouble.
Notre Dame won and I’m bumping them up off the bubble. Hard to see how they’d miss out now.
Arkansas lost handily at Tennessee and I’m taking them off the bubble in the other direction – 0 road/neutral wins + RPI in the 70s now + losing SEC record = NIT. Also falling backwards off the bubble is Wyoming after losing at home to Air Force.
Obviously Miami missed out on a chance to solidy themselves. Dayton tread water, as does St. Louis (who are in very good shape now) and UConn. Other games pending.
From NC State’s perspective, the competition for those last few spots continues to weaken.
Poor Tim Miles
Loses to Boise State. CSU are this close to being off the bubble.
New Mexico wins at SDSU and I am moving them into the “safe” category for now.
Danc Card is back!
http://www.unf.edu/~jcoleman/dance.htm
This is such a great site to follow over the next month. And great news for us – we are 39th in the Dance Card rankings and well within the bubble, through games of Feb. 12.
Dance Card is surprisingly high on K-State and Texas. Their last 4 in (not counting teams that should get auto-bids) are Xavier, Miami, Northwestern, and Arizona. First four out are St. Joe’s, Washington, Minnesota, and Dayton. I may have dropped St. Joe’s too soon – adding them back to my watch list.
Dance Card is not high in Cincinnati (and neither am I), Arkansas (ditto), or Wyoming and Colorado State (also ditto).
Thursday
During commercial breaks, flip to West Virginia at Pitt (ESPN), Vanderbilt at Ole Miss (ESPN2), and keep an eye on Arizona at Washington State on the scoreboard. All start at 9.
Later on, BYU plays at San Francisco at 10 on ESPNU. Oregon plays Cal at 10:30, and The Fighting Herbles play Washington at 11.
I'm glad you continue to run with this
Fully invested again I see.
The Vandy-Ole Piss game is a two-fer (as TOB would say).
Are we supposed to be cheering for the Fighting Herbles tonight then?
I didn't come up with this one.
Not sure who did, but it’s been around for a while. Still makes me laugh every time I dig it up.
by non_sequitur on Feb 16, 2012 8:47 PM EST up reply actions
Saturday Morning
The Bracket Project guy is back from vacation and has updated his matrix. Looking only at brackets updated on Friday or Saturday, we are in 20 of the 22 projections. Here are the teams out of 2 or more brackets and in 2 or more brackets of that set:
Alabama 20 of 22
NCSU 20 of 22
Illinois 18 of 22
Xavier 18 of 22
Arizona 17 of 22
Miami 13 of 22
Cincy 11 of 22
Washington 11 of 22
Minnesota 9 of 22
Northwestern 7 of 22
Dayton 5 of 22
UCF 3 of 22
just sick
I think tuesday night may doom us.
the morale is too low, team feels like they gotta play against 8 everytime they step on the court and they haven’t been successful at that.
UNC will be going for kill shots, the question is, how much fight do we have left in us?
We still got Miami, VT, and Clemson. If we lose against UNC, which is very likely, we have to be Clemson otherwise this thing may snow ball and we dont win another game the rest of the season. Hopefully thats enough hyperbole for one post but its just how i feel right now.
I love the Steelers.
by tannofsteel84 on Feb 19, 2012 9:11 PM EST up reply actions
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