NCAA tourney hopes

[XUFan09]

No, you're missing the point. Sure, they get regular reports with the numbers, but that is only a minor part of their analysis, and they know things like Kenpom are heavily weighted on preseason expectations early in the season. They actually know how good ASU was because they have Committee members who watch them play. When discussions of teams' wins and losses come up, these members can give specifics on the opponents with no need for numbers.

Arizona St had lost to Sacramento St just a few weeks before.

And the thing is, if Arizona St were to go 3-15 in Pac 12 play(totally not expecting that but just for discussions sake)-the game wouldn't be viewed as a good win at all. Just like the LSU win if LSU doesn't wake up won't help Marquette out at all whatsoever.

Sorry- but Marquette absolutely needs for Arizona St to hold up. And they need LSU to get their head out of their you know what.

They lost to Sacramento State 11 days before the Marquette game in their season opener. However, 8 days after the Marquette game, they also beat a solid Creighton team AT Creighton (make no mistake, the homecourt advantage up in Omaha has a lot of respect) and then 3 days after that beat a good Texas A&M team by double digits at home. If you're going to talk about the surrounding games, you need to talk about both the good and the bad. They're not going to be seen as a great win for Marquette, as there is some inconsistency in their performance, but they will definitely be seen as a solid win based off how they played around that time. That's true whether they go undefeated in conference play or if they don't win a game. Their RPI/Kenpom/Sagarin that isn't finalized until months after the Marquette game happened isn't as important as how the team was subjectively viewed by Committee Members in second half of November and first half of December.

[stever20]

at the end of the day though, Arizona St would be measured on paper by where they finish. On the sheet the committee gets- the only thing that is mentioned is the team name, when the game was played, and their final RPI. That's it. And it's done by rating, so if Arizona St was outside the top 100, they would be in the 3rd column..... Also when they say games against top 100 teams top 50 teams- it's not the rating at the time of the game. It's the rating at the end of the season.

Just like the other way where if a team wins a game that early on looks mediocre but the team turns out to be really good- that win will take on greater importance than it would at the time of the game.

[anXUfan]

Their RPI/Kenpom/Sagarin that isn't finalized until months after the Marquette game happened isn't as important as how the team was subjectively viewed by Committee Members in second half of November and first half of December.

Not sure about this. It would require the selection committee to have an understanding of how each team stood at every possible point throughout the season. Seems too complicated to be true.

[XUFan09]

Their RPI/Kenpom/Sagarin that isn't finalized until months after the Marquette game happened isn't as important as how the team was subjectively viewed by Committee Members in second half of November and first half of December.

Not sure about this. It would require the selection committee to have an understanding of how each team stood at every possible point throughout the season. Seems too complicated to be true.

Like I said before, each conference has two members who are in charge of monitoring it, a primary and a secondary representative. I guarantee that those in charge of the Big East watch more Big East basketball than me, and I can give a solid subjective profile and narrative of each team last year. This comes into play two different ways:

1) The Committee has a weekly conference call where the primary representative for each conference gives a report on the conference, and obviously the secondary representative and the other members can chime in if need be. Thus, there are weekly updates on noteworthy teams (e.g. They won't talk about DePaul much).

2) When discussing tournament selection and seeding, the primary and secondary monitors will give their take when a team is brought up. For example, when discussing Marquette, if ASU tanked, the Pac-12 representatives would say something like, "Yeah, but the Sun Devils were actually a solid team back in late November. That's a pretty good win for Marquette."

When some team is seeded very differently from what the objective criteria would indicate and everyone is in an uproar, it's because people don't understand the strong subjective component that goes into tournament selection and seeding. Usually the objective and subjective analysis will line up, but there are times where it can significantly differ. For example, Providence will probably be judged better than their Kenpom rating of 46 because they have one of the best players in the nation at the end of close games.

[stever20]

updated after this weekend...
Villanova- yes/yes
Xavier- yes/yes
Providence- yes/yes
Butler- yes/yes
Seton Hall- yes/no.
Marquette- no/no 20-11 (going 9-9) RPI is only 92.3.
Georgetown- no/no
Creighton- no/no

my feelings on how many wins it'd take to get in...
Nova 8
X 8
PC 8
Butler 8
Seton Hall 9
Marquette 10 maybe, 11 for sure
Georgetown 10(with win over UConn- otherwise 11)
Creighton 11

I think 4 is pretty much a lock. I think the odds are really good that one of Seton Hall, Marquette, or Georgetown even happens. And 2 of those 3 wouldn't be the biggest shock in the world(thinking Seton Hall/Georgetown quite possibly).