Bracketology '17

[Hall2012]

Well Xavier needs to lose a little and drop to the 11 seed or win a little more and jump to the 6 seed. As easy as it sounds right?

I vote option A. They can start by losing tomorrow

Seton Hall has had Xavier's number and I don't see that changing this year

I guess you're in the minority lol. From what I've seen, most X fans seem to expect a comfortable win tomorrow, even without Sumner.

[stever20]

Marquette fans right now are far more worried just about making the tourney.

Marquette right now reminds me of Seton Hall last year. Where they won the Big East tourney, and still wound up as the last 6 seed. Garbage OOC schedule will hurt their seed big time(and there's no conjecture about that at all- it wasn't good).

Why I discount teams going undefeated and running the table from here. Of the 351 teams in d1- only 10 are undefeated in conference play at the 50% mark. Only 25 have 1 loss. Sure it could happen. But realistically it won't happen. There's a ton of parity in college basketball where it's really hard to go on a run like you describe. I mean just look at last week with the top 10 teams in the nation and all the losses they took.

[Bill Marsh]

I vote option A. They can start by losing tomorrow

Seton Hall has had Xavier's number and I don't see that changing this year

I guess you're in the minority lol. From what I've seen, most X fans seem to expect a comfortable win tomorrow, even without Sumner.

Can Summer be replaced that easily?

[JohnW22]

Can Summer be replaced that easily?

No, and it won't be close. At the same time I think Xavier's plan B for Sumner is better than Creighton's plan B for Watson but at the same time Creighton is a much better team. Quentin Goodin has to grow up fast which he has in the past two games but he's going to have to play 30-35 minutes a game for the rest of the season. The big question will be who backs Goodin up at the point, I think the most likely option is Bernard as he handled the ball a lot at Florida A&M but that was partly because he was their best player. Will be a really interesting final 10 games. The real question now is if Sumner comes back next season, honestly the ACL injury might be the only thing that keeps him in college for another season.

[stever20]

1 thing that will be fascinating to see will be in 10 days when they do the 1 month out reveal of the top 4 seeds in each region. That should give bracketologists a good idea of what this years committee is looking at- and will help them out tremendously one would think.

[GumbyDamnit!]

1 thing that will be fascinating to see will be in 10 days when they do the 1 month out reveal of the top 4 seeds in each region. That should give bracketologists a good idea of what this years committee is looking at- and will help them out tremendously one would think.

Not sure how much it will tell about the bubble criteria at this point since it's only focusing on the Top 16, but we'll see. We could probably pick a combination of 20 teams today that will make up the selections:

Locks:
VU (1)
Zags (1)
KU (1)
UK (2)
Baylor (1)
L'ville (2)
Ariz (2)
UNC (2)

Near Locks:
Wisconsin (3)
Butler (3)

In mix:
UCLA (4)
UVA (3)
WVU (3)
Oregon (4)
FSU (4)
Duke (4)

FL
St Marys
S Car
MD

Outside looking in:
UC
CU
ND
Purdue
X

16 of those top 20 are going to be your top 4 seeds in each region IMO. I put the seeding next to what I expect to see. Lots of hoops between now and then, though...

[stever20]

right but lets look at your 20...
Nova 2 RPI 6 KP
Gonzaga 12 RPI 1 KP
Kansas 3 RPI 8 KP
Kentucky 8 RPI 3 KP
Baylor 1 RPI 7 KP
Louisville 4 RPI 4 KP
Arizona 6 RPI 14 KP
UNC 7 RPI 9 KP
Wisconsin 21 RPI 11 KP
Butler 5 RPI 18 KP
UCLA 22 RPI 17 KP
Virginia 13 RPI 2 KP
West Virginia 27 RPI 5 KP
Oregon 10 RPI 19 KP
Florida St 11 RPI 23 KP
Duke 17 RPI 13 KP
Florida 9 RPI 10 KP
St Mary's 19 RPI 15 KP
South Carolina 20 RPI 24 KP
Maryland 18 RPI 40 KP
Cincy 16 RPI 16 KP
Creighton 15 RPI 25 KP
Notre Dame 25 RPI 27 KP
Purdue 30 RPI 12 KP
Xavier 14 RPI 28 KP

It'll be interesting to see- and telling- where and if West Virginia is included. They have pretty poor RPI, but a great Ken Pom. Conversely a team like a Florida St would be great RPI, poor Ken Pom. Things like that will be huge to see.

[XU85]

Hall 2012:

Where are those X fans of which you speak? X was a mess before Sumner got hurt and never really put it together this year. As John pointed out, next to Nova the Hall is the one team that really seems to have X's number even when X was favored. I know of no one expecting a win, much less a comfortable win.

[Hall2012]

Hall 2012:

Where are those X fans of which you speak? X was a mess before Sumner got hurt and never really put it together this year. As John pointed out, next to Nova the Hall is the one team that really seems to have X's number even when X was favored. I know of no one expecting a win, much less a comfortable win.

I was mainly referencing the XavierHoops.com pick the score thread for the game. While I obviously expected the majority to pick X (that's how being a fan works), I was surprised to see it completely unanimous. And more than a few by 3+ possessions.

[XU85]

Hall 2012:

Where are those X fans of which you speak? X was a mess before Sumner got hurt and never really put it together this year. As John pointed out, next to Nova the Hall is the one team that really seems to have X's number even when X was favored. I know of no one expecting a win, much less a comfortable win.

I was mainly referencing the XavierHoops.com pick the score thread for the game. While I obviously expected the majority to pick X (that's how being a fan works), I was surprised to see it completely unanimous. And more than a few by 3+ possessions.

That makes sense. I don't usually look at the prediction thread, but now that you mention it, I did earlier to today and remembered being surprised by all the predictions of X winning (although the margin of victory seemed smaller than usual).