Bubble Watch

[stever20]

the thing about Xavier right now is they have no one to blame but themselves. If they had beaten Long Beach, Auburn, DePaul, or Creighton, they would not be in this situation right now. They should be at 20 wins right now and a total lock. If they had won just those 4 games, they would be #13 in the RPI right now. They would be 9-5 in the conference and in 3rd place. They would be 7-5 away from home. All their problems would be gone. They would be really in play for a top 3 seed quite frankly. Only 13 teams with fewer than 7 losses(they would be at 20-6).

[Bill Marsh]

Based on past committees' decisions, these are the bubble teams who are vulnerable to being dropped long before Xavier:

Boise State - 116 SOS
Davidson - 112 SOS
Tulsa - 89 SOS
BYU - 76 SOS

As few as 18 wins will be valued far more against a 12 SOS than 20 wins against an SOS of 100+.

Wanna talk bad losses? Tulsa's loss to Oral Roberts (191 RPI) is the mother of bad losses. But as bad as that is, it wasn't even their worst loss. That came against D-II SE Oklahoma State.

[GumbyDamnit!]

Here's what is hilarious about Stever. He points to the LBS loss as potentially bad for X as LBS is hovering around 100. But he fails to recognize that Cincy has lost to both ECU (200+) and Tulane (150+). If X beats Cincy guess what happens Stever? X replaces Cincy as a lock. If Cincy wins they are home and expected to win. X then just needs to get to .500 in conf. I feel great about 6. It's going to happen people. AAC will struggle mightily for 3 if UC loses to X.

The problem though is the LBS loss would become their 4th bad loss. 4 bad losses is much worse than 2 bad losses.

And if X beats Cincy- they still aren't a lock. They would still need to get 2 more wins. 18-14 is not a lock situation under any circumstances. I'd love to have some of what you guys are smoking if you really believe that.

No one from seed 8 to the last team taken is a lock at this point. Every team needs to win games obviously. But for all of of Cincy's great AAC wins, they currently sit at #39 RPI and X is at 41. They have 3 100+ losses and X has 4 now that LBS is 101. Big deal. Cincy also lost to Memphis who sits at 96.

But according to you, if X beats Cincy on their home floor, they are still in worse shape than Cincy.?. Is that what you're trying to sell us? Got it. I'm sure if both are bubble teams the committee will just disregard the game entirely. All of the pressure is on Cincy to win this game. A home loss hurts a LOT more than losing on the road as an underdog.

But, yeah, just like SJU, UCONN, and FL you already know what's going to happen so I should shut up.

[GumbyDamnit!]

Tulsa. How is this team anywhere near the bubble? They have 17 wins. 14 of those came vs teams with an RPI of 125 or higher. 10 of those vs teams of an RPI of 200+. They are 1-4 vs RPI Top 50. Also lost to the #194 team. Slop.

[stever20]

Based on past committees' decisions, these are the bubble teams who are vulnerable to being dropped long before Xavier:

Boise State - 116 SOS
Davidson - 112 SOS
Tulsa - 89 SOS
BYU - 76 SOS

As few as 18 wins will be valued far more against a 12 SOS than 20 wins against an SOS of 100+.

Wanna talk bad losses? Tulsa's loss to Oral Roberts (191 RPI) is the mother of bad losses. But as bad as that is, it wasn't even their worst loss. That came against D-II SE Oklahoma State.

Bill the committee has just not shown that in the past several years. They just haven't. I don't get what is so hard to understand about that..... They do not send teams with only a 18-14 record to the tourney.

Here's what is hilarious about Stever. He points to the LBS loss as potentially bad for X as LBS is hovering around 100. But he fails to recognize that Cincy has lost to both ECU (200+) and Tulane (150+). If X beats Cincy guess what happens Stever? X replaces Cincy as a lock. If Cincy wins they are home and expected to win. X then just needs to get to .500 in conf. I feel great about 6. It's going to happen people. AAC will struggle mightily for 3 if UC loses to X.

The problem though is the LBS loss would become their 4th bad loss. 4 bad losses is much worse than 2 bad losses.

And if X beats Cincy- they still aren't a lock. They would still need to get 2 more wins. 18-14 is not a lock situation under any circumstances. I'd love to have some of what you guys are smoking if you really believe that.

No one from seed 8 to the last team taken is a lock at this point. Every team needs to win games obviously. But for all of of Cincy's great AAC wins, they currently sit at #39 RPI and X is at 41. They have 3 100+ losses and X has 4 now that LBS is 101. Big deal. Cincy also lost to Memphis who sits at 96.

But according to you, if X beats Cincy on their home floor, they are still in worse shape than Cincy.?. Is that what you're trying to sell us? Got it. I'm sure if both are bubble teams the committee will just disregard the game entirely. All of the pressure is on Cincy to win this game. A home loss hurts a LOT more than losing on the road as an underdog.

But, yeah, just like SJU, UCONN, and FL you already know what's going to happen so I should shut up.

Did I say that X would be in worse shape than Cincy? Show that to me.... What I actually said was that X would still have to win 2 more games to get up to 19 wins. I didn't even mention Cincy.

OH and about St John's- I would not go putting them in a lock status just yet at all. They need to get at least 3 more wins. Still with Georgetown 2x, Seton Hall, Xavier, Marquette, and Nova. The X win helped them for sure- but they are hardly a lock right now. As any St John's fan will tell you- can't celebrate until they have the bid locked up. And, UConn isn't a done thing yet at all. If they beat Memphis 2x, SMU, and Temple on the road, they would be in. Or if they can get 3 of those and then win a couple in the tourney, they would be in even if they don't win the conference.

[stever20]

Tulsa. How is this team anywhere near the bubble? They have 17 wins. 14 of those came vs teams with an RPI of 125 or higher. 10 of those vs teams of an RPI of 200+. They are 1-4 vs RPI Top 50. Also lost to the #194 team. Slop.

Part of it is the softness of the bubble quite frankly.

Thing for them is they have 4 games left with top 100 teams. If they can get at least 2 if not 3 wins there, they solidify their place big time. The committee has to come up with 36 teams. Going to be a real challenge there I think.

[Bill Marsh]

Tulsa. How is this team anywhere near the bubble? They have 17 wins. 14 of those came vs teams with an RPI of 125 or higher. 10 of those vs teams of an RPI of 200+. They are 1-4 vs RPI Top 50. Also lost to the #194 team. Slop.

Good question. But "bracketologists" seem to like them. Lunardi has them in. So do CBS, College Sports Madness and Team Rankings. But this is the kind of team that Stever ignores when analyzing Xavier. These same bracketologists like Xavier too. So, right now both are in. But if Xavier falters and someone else surges, the committee will have choices to make about who to keep and who to let go.

Would you keep the team that lost to SE Oklahoma State and Oral Roberts? While Stever is nitpicking Long Beach State's RPI to see if they're over or under 100, Oral Roberts is flirting with 200!

[ta111]

I suggest you read this article by Patrick Stevens. http://www.syracuse.com/patrick-stevens ... ry_package

Again this is the guy who has been the most accurate in the past several years and got every team correct last year.

[RedStormHoops]

If you dissect Tulsa and their resume there isn't one way you can convince me they deserve in

[Bill Marsh]

Here's another little tidbit in the Xavier (16-10) vs Tulsa (17-7). If you go to CBS Bracketology, you can compare any 2 teams. When you compare these 2, you find the following records vs teams ranked 200+

Tulsa 10-0
Xavier 2-0

So, if we ignore these utterly useless games, here are the 2 teams' records

Tulsa 7-7
XU 14-10

In other words, Tulsa's schedule is padded both in conference and out with 10 cup cakes. Exclusive of those games, they're a .500 team.