Wed 2/4/2014 Games - 3 Games

[stever20]

not necessarily in terms of a mid-major. frequently a mid-major conference with a rpi team 42 gets left out.

Xavier right now is they're starting to accumulate a lot of bad things. poor road/neutral record, 3 bad losses, poor overall record. 1 of those things isn't by itself a problem, but them as a whole is a HUGE problem.

[Bill Marsh]

We could be down to just 4 bids if xavier, st john's and seton hall don't step it up.

The Big East has already established it's place in the pecking order for this season. If OOC wins were currency, then the Vig East teams are now sitting around the poker table and are simply dividing up the same pile of cash, shifting it from one ember to another.

If the BE gets only 4 bids, it will mean that the top 4 teams have run away from the rest of the league, have stockpiled all the cash for themselves, and will all get very high seeds. More likely is that we still get 5-7 bids. There's no way for the ?Big east to lose it's standing relative to other conferences at this point! which means that individual teams will still stack up very well.

Bottom line is that someone's going to win the remaining games.

[billyjack]

Seton Hall, Xavier, and even St John's are in much better shape that many here think. I think because each of them lost this week, our perception is that they're in bad shape. With as many bumps as SJU for example has hit, their RPI is still in the 40's, and XU and SHU are in the 30's-40's.

A week ago, there were several non-BE teams that were getting attention, but also hit bumps, and have nose-dived... Davidson, Miami, NC State, St Mary's, Washington, Kansas State... these guys and others are on thin ice. And what teams have replaced them...? UMass, Richmond, Illinois...? A bunch of teams that will also certainly collapse. Tulsa and Temple are 2 others that a week from now could follow Davidson out of the picture.

The key is that you can't say "St John's lost at Butler, so now they're toast"... because someone has to replace their spot... who...? Each of their fellow bubble teams has worse warts, but lack SJU's positives.

[Bill Marsh]

Lunardi still has both Hall and X in his field today despite the bad losses they picked up this week. They took some seed damage though, and 9 and 11. Johnnies slip to the 1st 4 out, leaving the BE with 6 teams in at the moment.

seems about right. Xavier next to last bye team. Seton Hall a 9 sounds high but looking at teams, not really....

Just wish PC didn't have those bad losses.

agreed. hopefully their tourney fate doesn't come down to something this nit-picky but when compared to another team with similar bad losses, do you think SHU's 2 being to the same opponent will be looked at more or less favorably than someone who lost them to 2 different opponents?

I doubt that it matters much. A bad loss is a bad loss. I think that more significant is whether the bad losses were home, away, or on a neutral court. One of the DePaul losses was on the road to a conference rival. Almost everyone in every league gets hit with those kinds of losses, so I think the committee understands those if the rest of the record I'd good. There is no doubt that the loss at home hurts, but they also have some good wins to offset that.

In Seton Hall's case, the most mitigating factor is the loss of Whitehead. The committee does take injuries into account. At least the .seton Hall case can be viewed with an explanation for some of their losses. That factor is now behind them, so they can be viewed as a relatively strong tournament team if they play up to form the rest of the way.

[Westbrook#36]

Was surfing around this morning checking out BE links and it seems Matt Carlino is a wee bit upset with Arcidiacono. He thinks that fall of his was a dirty play by Archie and a bush league move. First off, absolutely glad that he wasn't seriously injured, that was one scary fall. On the other hand, whatever Carlino, you're the one who left their feet out of control trying for the sportscenter volley spike block on a pump fake, Archie had his back to you and was just trying to get to the line. Nothing at all dirty about that. Again very, very thankful that Carlino is alright, 100% understand the emotion, but to think there was anything remotely dirty about that is barking up the wrong tree.

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/sports/290868441.html

[stever20]

We could be down to just 4 bids if xavier, st john's and seton hall don't step it up.

The Big East has already established it's place in the pecking order for this season. If OOC wins were currency, then the Vig East teams are now sitting around the poker table and are simply dividing up the same pile of cash, shifting it from one ember to another.

If the BE gets only 4 bids, it will mean that the top 4 teams have run away from the rest of the league, have stockpiled all the cash for themselves, and will all get very high seeds. More likely is that we still get 5-7 bids. There's no way for the ?Big east to lose it's standing relative to other conferences at this point! which means that individual teams will still stack up very well.

Bottom line is that someone's going to win the remaining games.

There's still 1 OOC game which is huge- Xavier @ Cincy.

Looking at RPI forecast- here's the odds of teams doing enough to get in the tourney before the BET.
Xavier 55% to get to 19-12.
Seton Hall 55% to get to 19-11
St John's 23% to get to 19-11

I think 5 is the likely number now, and we're far more likely to get 4 in over 6 or 7.

The problem Bill with your example is DePaul, Creighton, and Marquette have been stealing a lot of money.
St John's got money stolen by DePaul, Creighton
Seton Hall got money stolen by DePaul 2x
Xavier got money stolen by DePaul, Creighton

That's money that just vanishes from the conference effectively. Yeah it makes DePaul stronger(4-1 vs those 3 teams), but still that is meaningless. Hurts those 3 FAR more than it helps DePaul.

[stever20]

Seton Hall, Xavier, and even St John's are in much better shape that many here think. I think because each of them lost this week, our perception is that they're in bad shape. With as many bumps as SJU for example has hit, their RPI is still in the 40's, and XU and SHU are in the 30's-40's.

A week ago, there were several non-BE teams that were getting attention, but also hit bumps, and have nose-dived... Davidson, Miami, NC State, St Mary's, Washington, Kansas State... these guys and others are on thin ice. And what teams have replaced them...? UMass, Richmond, Illinois...? A bunch of teams that will also certainly collapse. Tulsa and Temple are 2 others that a week from now could follow Davidson out of the picture.

The key is that you can't say "St John's lost at Butler, so now they're toast"... because someone has to replace their spot... who...? Each of their fellow bubble teams has worse warts, but lack SJU's positives.

The thing with all 3 teams is they still have a lot of tough games left.
Seton Hall still has Marquette, Georgetown, Providence, Nova, St John's, Creighton, Providence, and Georgetown
Xavier still has Providence, Marquette, St John's, Cincy, Butler, St Johns, Villanova, and Creighton
St John's still has Creighton, DePaul, Xavier, Georgetown, Seton Hall, Xavier, Georgetown, Marquette, and Villanova

With how many wins each of these 3 teams need(SH with 4, Xavier with 5, SJ with 6)- that's tough. SH still has 5 of 8 games left with top 4 teams(plus 1 with St John's). Xavier still has 3 of 8 games left with top 4 teams, plus Cincy and 2 with St John's. St John's still has left 3 of 9 games left with top 4 teams- plus 2 with Xavier and 1 with Seton Hall. So all 3 have 6 tough games left out of 8 or 9 games.

Also other teams have stepped up. Purdue is now absolutely a major factor- they are in fact in today in Lunardi's latest bracket. UCLA has started to step up- with a game like tonight at Stanford likely propelling them into the tourney mix with a win.

Bottom line- our 3 bubbles do have a chance to control their own fate. however if they don't step up, they just aren't getting in. If say St John's only wins 4 of the games, even if others have flopped- some one else will have stepped up. So yeah they're in good shape from a control your own fate thing, but with how brutal the schedule is, it's a 50/50 at best type of thing.

[Bill Marsh]

Seton Hall, Xavier, and even St John's are in much better shape that many here think. I think because each of them lost this week, our perception is that they're in bad shape. With as many bumps as SJU for example has hit, their RPI is still in the 40's, and XU and SHU are in the 30's-40's.

A week ago, there were several non-BE teams that were getting attention, but also hit bumps, and have nose-dived... Davidson, Miami, NC State, St Mary's, Washington, Kansas State... these guys and others are on thin ice. And what teams have replaced them...? UMass, Richmond, Illinois...? A bunch of teams that will also certainly collapse. Tulsa and Temple are 2 others that a week from now could follow Davidson out of the picture.

The key is that you can't say "St John's lost at Butler, so now they're toast"... because someone has to replace their spot... who...? Each of their fellow bubble teams has worse warts, but lack SJU's positives.

Exactly. What other teams are doing matters. Here's the latest from RPI Forecast:

BIG EAST

8. Villanova
19. Butler
22. Georgetown
25. Providence
36. Xavier
42. Seton Hall
61. St. John's
134. Marquette
143. DePaul
147. Creighton

As for the bubble, there are 16 teams in the top RPI Forecast top 50. With 36 at-large bids up for grabs, that means that they will be going as deep as #52 for those 36 bids, barring lower ranked teams winning conference tournaments and stealing bids (which will probably happen in a few cases). So here's what the bubble looks like:

Last 8 In:

52. Florida
51. Texas A&M
49. Iowa
47. Davidson
46. Temple
45. LSU
44. BYU
42. Seton Hall

First 8 Out:

53. Boise State
54. Richmond
56. St. Mary's
57. GW
59. UCLA
61. St. John's
62. NC State
63. Miami

So by this measure, Seton Hall projects to be in and is barely considered a bubble team. At the other end, St. John's is out but is still a bubble team - barely.

Bottom line is that for all the struggles our teams are having, there are others in worse shape as you quite accurately point out, Billy Jack.

[stever20]

just looking at Lunardi's bracket math- Seton Hall is 36 right now, Xavier is 41(next to last bye). St John's 2nd team out right now.

[ChestRockwell85]

Carlino looked COMPLETELY out of it after that happened. Maybe he should wait until the concussion is done with before speaking. Also, the kid is young and is going to try and tough it out. He is going to tell the coaches he is OK regardless of how he is really feeling. The fact they let him play again after that is ridiculous. Watch the replay, look at his eyes, that kid didn't know what planet he was on after that play.

In regards to it being a dirty play, it just wasn't. Arch isn't that type of player and it happened FAST. What was Arch supposed to do? Put a pillow on the floor for the kid to land on?

I am happy Carlino is OK, I was really concerned for him last night. The REAL concern is how the Marquette coaches let him play again after that fall though. Again, kid was completely out of it.