Our resident Bracketologist, The Bracketeer, has returned to give his predictions for the 2015-16 season. He is a long time contributor to White & Blue Review and matches up with some of the best bracketologists in the nation. Follow him all season long as Creighton looks to get back to the NCAA Tournament.
A few guidelines for everyone looking at the bracket and how I came to my projections (games through January 24):
- I tried to seed teams as if it were actually Selection Sunday. So some teams may seem a bit high or a bit low compared to what others have presently. However, based on the numbers to date, that’s where I believe they would be seeded when you factor in SOS, Top-50 wins, Top-100 wins, etc. With most teams still having half of their regular season games remaining, there are a lot of “incomplete” resumes this early in the process
- Since we are early in the process, there will be some teams that appear in the bracket that have below .500 records in their conference. Although the common thought that below .500 in your league = no at-large bid, since 2000, 10 such teams (all from “power” conferences) have received an at-large nod. Most conferences are only a handful of games into league play – so some teams with sub-.500 league records will be in the field of 68, presently.
- As the NCAA selection committee is supposed to do, I attempted to avoid match-ups that would involve rematches from this season and teams from the same conference potentially playing each other (generally until the Sweet 16). Also, teams cannot play in their home arena (e.g., Providence can’t play in the “Providence Region”). If necessary, the committee in the past has allowed for a “one-seed” movement from a team’s “true” seed to help in putting together the bracket.
- I’ve used information from the various RPI/efficiency sites out there in compiling my somewhat educated guesses but will mostly site RPI, KenPom and RPI Forecast.
- Below the bracket, I’ve also listed the “Last Four In”, “First Four Out” and “Next Four Out”.
Now for the bracket projection (January 25)…
LAST FOUR IN: Butler, Oregon State, Texas Tech, St. Joseph’s
FIRST FOUR OUT: Boise State, Alabama, Kansas State, Cincinnati
NEXT FOUR OUT: Clemson, Gonzaga, Ohio State, Syracuse
MULTIPLE BID LEAGUES: Pac-12 (10), ACC (7), Big 12 (7), Big Ten (6), Big East (5), A-10 (4), SEC (4)
Next bracket projection: Monday, February 1
5 Things About This Week’s Projection
1. Even though all four #1-seeds lost from last week’s projection (Oklahoma, Xavier, Kansas and Villanova), they all remained as #1-seeds in this week’s bracket. The above four mentioned teams still have superior overall résumés to the other contenders – although Iowa and North Carolina both have strong cases for that #1-seed line. Many actually do have UNC as a #1-seed ahead of either Xavier or Kansas. Although the Tar Heels have an NCAA-best 11 wins vs. the RPI top 100, only two are against the Top 50 (Maryland [11] & UCLA [50]). They have several wins on the periphery of the Top 50 (Florida State [52], Kansas State [53], Syracuse [54] and Davidson [55]). However, none of those teams made this version of the bracket.
2. Just when you thought the Pac-12 likely maxed-out at nine projected tournament berths in last week’s bracket, in comes Oregon State as one of the last four teams into the field. They offset their home loss to UCLA on Wednesday with an impressive win over USC yesterday. Also helping the Beavers into the projected field was that the rest of the bubble teams didn’t really do much this week. I’ll admit, I’d be completely shocked if the Pac-12 ended up with 10 (or even 9 bids) come Selection Sunday. However, the league has collectively put itself into a position where 6 or 7 bids is almost a certainty.
3. By-and-large, non-conference play is completed by the time New Year’s rolls around. However, the Big 12/SEC Challenge will be played in its entriety (10 games) on Saturday… While there are a couple marquee matchups (Iowa State at Texas A&M, Kentucky at Kansas), below are matchups to watch that could have NCAA at-large implications:
West Virginia at Florida – The Gators could really use a quality win (1-4 vs Top 50), however, it could be tough to get against the road savvy Mountaineers (8-2 in road/neutral games)…
Mississippi at Kansas State – While Ole Miss is nowhere near the “bubble”, Kansas State is right on it. This would be a horrible loss for the Wildcats when March rolls around.
Georgia at Baylor – Georgia (RPI 61) has played a decent enough schedule this year (non con SOS of 22) but didn’t capitalize on those opportunities (0-4 vs Top 50). A win at Baylor would certainly bring the Bulldogs into the at-large conversation.
Oklahoma at LSU – With all the talent LSU has, its not too far fetched to think the Tigers could still get themselves into NCAA Tourney consideration. A win against the Sooners would be a large step in that direction.
4. As mentioned in the introduction to the bracket, I do try to place teams into the bracket as if it were Selection Sunday. However, I currently have five teams into the projected field that have sub-.500 conference records. This would be the most in any season. As also mentioned in the introduction, since 2000, only 10 teams have received an at-large berth with a sub-.500 league ledger. Add to it, all of those teams were from conferences that were in the Top 3 of the RPI in that particular season. So, if this actually were Selection Sunday, it is highly unlikely that Butler or Seton Hall would be included in the NCAA field and only somewhat likely that Texas Tech, UCLA or Oregon State would find their way into the bracket.
5. At 5-2 in the Big East, Creighton continues to surpass expectations placed on it during the preseason. Unfortuanetly, that doesn’t factor into consideration when it comes to Selection Sunday. Although KenPom (34) likes the Jays a lot better than RPI (90) does, it will be tough to sell the Selection Committee on a non con SOS of 278 and a non con best win against Nebraska (RPI 156). For those who like to play the “what if” game, RPI Forecast has a tool on its site that allows you to put in results for upcoming games for a particular team. I still think 11-7 is a minimum requirement in the Big East for CU to garner any kind of at-large consideration. However, their does need to be some quality to that 11-7 league mark.
Let’s say the following results happened to get Creighton to 11-7 in the Big East:
Current Big East Record (5-2)
Projected Wins (6): at Georgetown, vs. Seton Hall, vs. DePaul, vs. St. John’s, Marquette 2x
Projected Losses (5): at Villanova, at Providence, at Butler, Xavier 2x
That would give the Jays a record of 20-11 overall and 11-7 in the Big East. However, it would also give them a projected RPI of 62 and a 1-9 mark vs the RPI Top 50 (they do not project Seton Hall to stay in the RPI top 50, so the Jays only RPI top 50 win would be vs Butler). In past years, this has been a typical résumé of a team hosting a first round NIT game.
Now, let’s look at this scenario for 11-7 in the Big East for CU:
Current Big East Record (5-2)
Projected Wins (6): vs. Seton Hall, vs. DePaul, vs. St. John’s, vs. Marquette, at Providence, vs. Xavier
Projected Losses (5): at Georgetown, at Marquette, at Villanova, at Butler, at Xavier
As in the above example, this would give the Jays a record of 20-11 overall and 11-7 in the Big East. Now the RPI only moves from 62 to 59, but you now have a 3-7 mark vs the Top 50 and a marquee win (Xavier). This résumé at least gets Creighton noticed and is more typical of an 11-seed/“last four in”.
Unless the NCAA Selection Committee has started to use KenPom’s ratings more than they have in the past, the Jays still have a lot of work to do to get consideration for an at-large berth.
Thanks for reading. The next edition of “The Bracketeer” will run on Monday, February 1…
