Zach Hayes is RTC’s resident bracketologist. He’ll regularly be out-scooping, out-thinking and out-shining Lunardi over the next two months.
Some quick notes:
- The final #1 seed came down to Syracuse and Villanova. The Orange gained the honor based on the #1 RPI in the nation, Villanova’s #115 SOS and two more wins than the Wildcats vs. the RPI top-100.
- Wisconsin barely edged West Virginia and BYU for the final #3 seed. The Badgers are carried by wins over Duke and Purdue and both a #10 RPI and #10 SOS. West Virginia, meanwhile, lacks any wins vs. the RPI top 25 and BYU, despite the gaudy record, simply doesn’t carry the same computer numbers or quality wins as their counterparts for the #3 seed.
- Bid stealer alert: Virginia is in the field due to the Cavs being the only undefeated ACC team remaining, therefore earning the conference’s automatic bid. While some may say that steals a bid from a more deserving team, I think it’s realistic. Remember Mississippi State last year? There’s always one team that crashes the bubble party.
- As you can see, the Pac-10 only earned two bids with Arizona State as the auto bid and California sneaking in behind their tremendous SOS as one of the final eight teams. Washington was one of the final eight teams left out and nobody else was even close. Two bids seems very realistic for this conference.
- As expected, there was a very large bubble at this early date. The final four teams in the field — Old Dominion, Richmond, Cincinnati and Texas A&M — earned bids based on varying reasons. Old Dominion’s win at Georgetown is looking tremendous and gave them a boost over Oklahoma State, Minnesota and Notre Dame, teams that lack such a dynamic victory (much like Arizona, the last team in a season ago, who won their first round game, I have the Monarchs knocking off the enigmatic Yellow Jackets). Richmond’s #30 RPI and three wins vs. the RPI top 50 carried the load. Cincinnati was the only team on the bubble (besides Marquette) with multiple wins vs. the RPI top 25 while Texas A&M benefited from a strong RPI/SOS (37/22) and the eye test from this past Saturday in their performance against #1 Texas.
- Believe it folks: The A-10 garnered more bids than the Big 10 and the Pac 10. None of the five teams in the field from the A-10 have an RPI below 31.
Last Four In: Old Dominion, Richmond, Cincinnati, Texas A&M.
Last Four Out: Oklahoma State, Notre Dame, Minnesota, Washington.
Next Four Out: Virginia Tech, Wichita State, Northwestern, Illinois.
Automatic bids: Vermont, Temple, Virginia, Campbell, Texas, Pittsburgh, Weber State, Coastal Carolina, Michigan State, Pacific, William & Mary, UAB, Butler, Cornell, Siena, Buffalo, Morgan State, Northern Iowa, BYU, Quinnipiac, Murray State, Arizona State, Lafayette, Kentucky, Charleston, Sam Houston State, Jackson State, Oakland, Western Kentucky, Gonzaga, Louisiana Tech.
Bids per conference: Big East (8), ACC (7), Big 12 (6), SEC (5), Atlantic-10 (5), Big 10 (4), Mountain West (3), Pac-10 (2), West Coast (2), Colonial (2).
Next bracket: January 25.