The Holy Land of Hoops

Three, count'em, Three Big East Teams now in the Top 10 in each poll. AP 'Nova 6, Xavier 7, Providence 10.
USA Today Coaches: 'Nova 6, Xavier 8, Providence 10.
Congrats, and let's get one or two more in there!

Sad that Butler is out of the polls. I still believe in them. I'm as high on Butler as I was a couple of months ago. I still think this a team that can compete and win against most of the Top 25 teams. The Big East schedule has been brutal for them. Wins against DePaul and Marquette would get them back on track

Butler now enters a stretch of games where they should be heavily favored to win the next four and the fifth being Seton Hall on the road. Certainly, they should go no worse than 4-1. They finish with Nova, Creighton, Seton Hall and Marquette at home. I have to believe they are favored in three of those (though I personally hope CU returns the favor from last year by sweeping them this year). The road games to finish are at Nova and at Georgetown. I think they are good enough to sweep the remaining 6 home games (or 5-1 worse case) and go at least 3-2 in the remaining road games. That means 8-3 or 9-2. 8 wins gets them to 10-8, and a strong last 10 games. 9 wins gets them to 11-7, and an even stronger last 10 games. I think with their OOC, they are in if they get to at least 10 wins in conference - particular given that would have meant a strong finish to the season. Win the next five and they are certainly back in the standings heading into the game with Nova. Of course, they have to now step up and perform.
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I agree that if Butler goes 10-8, they should be fine. Since losing at Xavier back on January 2nd, their Kenpom ranking has stayed steady in the 30s and their Sagarin Rating is currently 27th. In addition, they have some nice non-conference wins. About those wins, here's also the key: They all happened away from home. That's huge for the Selection Committee. Butler's projected non-conference SOS, though, looks weird when you consider the quality of a number of their opponents, as they come in at sub-par 198th. That's because their selection of buy games was awful, featuring two RPI 200s teams and two RPI 200s teams. Though not a buy game (I believe), Missouri State was also a sub-200 team. The thing is, the Selection Committee is aware of these details. They saw that Butler challenged itself in the non-conference schedule, playing six top 100 teams (three in the top 50), and the fact that their cupcake opponents were just worse than most teams' cupcakes won't really make a big difference in the subjective sense. That's why I think Butler will be fine even if they go 9-9 in the non-conference. It might be a little dicey at that point, I admit, but they're still probably fine.

cu blujs wrote:That means 8-3 or 9-2.

Yeah I don't see it. They're not beating Nova or Xavier, they'll do well to split with Seton Hall & Georgetown, and they'll probably drop one more between Creighton at home and @ Marquette.

XUFan09 wrote:Though not a buy game (I believe), Missouri State was also a sub-200 team.

Correct. Missouri State was the opening round game in the Puerto Rico tipoff.

On paper, Butler looks fine, and even as a sky-is-falling fan (I admit it), 9-9 in the league nets them a tournament spot. Their performance on the court has started to shake my (and a lot of other BU fans') confidence, though. A 4-game winning streak might even prop them back into the polls, too, even without a signature win.