Bracketology - January 1

[stever20]

Jerry Palm just released his new bracketology as well...5 from the Big East:
Villanova (2)
Seton Hall (4)
St. John's (5)
Butler (5)
Georgetown (9)

I won't complain about him only putting 5 Big East teams in, especially because he gave 4 of the 5 higher seeds than Lunardi did (both gave Villanova a 2 seed). It's only January so the bubble is very large right now and different guys are gonna lean different way on certain teams. But I want to know what he's smoking to put 7 B1G teams in the tournament (granted, 2 of them to play in games, but in is still in). If Penn State can lose to Rutgers and stay in the tourney field, then Big East teams should have no problem surviving a loss to DePaul.

Why not 7? Lunardi's last 2 in are Xavier and Providence. How can you keep them out?

Xavier - #32 in Sagarin's power ratings, but more importantly #22 in his predictive ratings. Using what we've learned about team's relative strengths so far in the season, Xavier has to be projected to win a lot of games in conference play.

Providence - What they have going for them is quality wins and no bad losses. Wins over Notre Dame, Miami, and UMass. And just by scheduling Kentucky on the road they helped their SOS and thereby their RPI. They are a solid pick at this point.

Xavier has some bad losses. Right now, they have 1 win of note the entire season, Georgetown.

Providence has the Brown loss which is a bad one. The Marquette loss remains to be seen how bad that loss is. They're in better shape by far than Xavier though.

[Jet915]

Jerry Palm just released his new bracketology as well...5 from the Big East:
Villanova (2)
Seton Hall (4)
St. John's (5)
Butler (5)
Georgetown (9)

I won't complain about him only putting 5 Big East teams in, especially because he gave 4 of the 5 higher seeds than Lunardi did (both gave Villanova a 2 seed). It's only January so the bubble is very large right now and different guys are gonna lean different way on certain teams. But I want to know what he's smoking to put 7 B1G teams in the tournament (granted, 2 of them to play in games, but in is still in). If Penn State can lose to Rutgers and stay in the tourney field, then Big East teams should have no problem surviving a loss to DePaul.

Why not 7? Lunardi's last 2 in are Xavier and Providence. How can you keep them out?

Xavier - #32 in Sagarin's power ratings, but more importantly #22 in his predictive ratings. Using what we've learned about team's relative strengths so far in the season, Xavier has to be projected to win a lot of games in conference play.

Providence - What they have going for them is quality wins and no bad losses. Wins over Notre Dame, Miami, and UMass. And just by scheduling Kentucky on the road they helped their SOS and thereby their RPI. They are a solid pick at this point.

You forgot the home loss to Brown, a horrible team. Notre Dame win is looking better and better though.

[stever20]

Jerry Palm just released his new bracketology as well...5 from the Big East:
Villanova (2)
Seton Hall (4)
St. John's (5)
Butler (5)
Georgetown (9)

I won't complain about him only putting 5 Big East teams in, especially because he gave 4 of the 5 higher seeds than Lunardi did (both gave Villanova a 2 seed). It's only January so the bubble is very large right now and different guys are gonna lean different way on certain teams. But I want to know what he's smoking to put 7 B1G teams in the tournament (granted, 2 of them to play in games, but in is still in). If Penn State can lose to Rutgers and stay in the tourney field, then Big East teams should have no problem surviving a loss to DePaul.

Why not 7? Lunardi's last 2 in are Xavier and Providence. How can you keep them out?

Xavier - #32 in Sagarin's power ratings, but more importantly #22 in his predictive ratings. Using what we've learned about team's relative strengths so far in the season, Xavier has to be projected to win a lot of games in conference play.

Providence - What they have going for them is quality wins and no bad losses. Wins over Notre Dame, Miami, and UMass. And just by scheduling Kentucky on the road they helped their SOS and thereby their RPI. They are a solid pick at this point.

You forgot the home loss to Brown, a horrible team. Notre Dame win is looking better and better though.

The Miami win meaning less and less though. They've won 2 games the last month. Savanah St and Charleston. They're in RPI forecast supposed to go 9-8, but I dunno. Just looks like the roof is going to cave in on them.

[billyjack]

The strength of our OOC wins includes a nice intangible factor:

vs the ACC, we're 7-1...
but to get there we had 5 different BE teams beat 6 different ACC teams.

vs the A-10, we're 7-1...
to get there, 4 different BE teams beat 7 different A-10 teams.

vs the B1G, we're 7-5...
to get there, we beat 7 different B1G teams... (our losses were good too, vs only the top of the B1G --> Wisc (2), Michigan State, Ohio State, and Indiana (who we also beat w GU), while we handled the midpack B1G).

Point being, each year, some sucky overrated midrange team from the ACC or B1G (or last year the A-10) will maybe get hot in conference play... usually that team then undeservedly skyrockets up the polls... like Miami or Virginia 2 years ago, or Nebraska last year... they're sucky teams that become "Vitale-Bilas love children", who eventually and expectedly (by people paying attention) flame out in the NCAA's...

This year, though, the Big East has boxed out these clown teams, because we as a conference have knocked off almost every one of these possible "Cinderella teams" (13 teams combined in the ACC and B1G) ... if any of these teams gets hot, we can point to one of our wins against them...

this extensive list includes Notre Dame, Miami, Florida State, Syracuse, Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Indiana, Minnesota, Northwestern, Illinois, Nebraska, Michigan, and Rutgers; throw in Oklahoma from the XII; throw in Stanford and Arizona State from the PAC-12; plus VCU, Rhody, La Salle, George Washington, Fordham, St Joe's, and UMass... actually, Notre Dame hasn't had too much press though they're off to a great start, and the conspiracy part of my brain thinks it's because PC beat them and would therefore need to get some love from it...

[BigmanU]

Looks like CBS has 8 teams in. Not alot of high seeds but, man the BEast is deep!

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/bracketology

Villanova 2
Seton Hall 4
St. Johns 9
Butler 9
Georgetown 10
Providence 10
Xavier 11
DePaul 15

NBC has 7 in

http://collegebasketballtalk.nbcsports. ... no-1-seed/

Villanova 2
Seton Hall 6
Butler 7
Georgetown 7
St. John’s 8
Providence 11
Xavier 11

[Xudash]

Jerry Palm just released his new bracketology as well...5 from the Big East:
Villanova (2)
Seton Hall (4)
St. John's (5)
Butler (5)
Georgetown (9)

I won't complain about him only putting 5 Big East teams in, especially because he gave 4 of the 5 higher seeds than Lunardi did (both gave Villanova a 2 seed). It's only January so the bubble is very large right now and different guys are gonna lean different way on certain teams. But I want to know what he's smoking to put 7 B1G teams in the tournament (granted, 2 of them to play in games, but in is still in). If Penn State can lose to Rutgers and stay in the tourney field, then Big East teams should have no problem surviving a loss to DePaul.

Why not 7? Lunardi's last 2 in are Xavier and Providence. How can you keep them out?

Xavier - #32 in Sagarin's power ratings, but more importantly #22 in his predictive ratings. Using what we've learned about team's relative strengths so far in the season, Xavier has to be projected to win a lot of games in conference play.

Providence - What they have going for them is quality wins and no bad losses. Wins over Notre Dame, Miami, and UMass. And just by scheduling Kentucky on the road they helped their SOS and thereby their RPI. They are a solid pick at this point.

Xavier has some bad losses. Right now, they have 1 win of note the entire season, Georgetown.

Providence has the Brown loss which is a bad one. The Marquette loss remains to be seen how bad that loss is. They're in better shape by far than Xavier though.

Xavier Wins of Note:

Georgetown
Seton Hall
Alabama (RPI 41)

Bad Losses:

DePaul
Auburn

Still a long way to go. We'll see what happens.