How many big east teams DANCING??

[HoyaSinceBirth]

I think 9 is the minimum that the big east will get in. We basically have 7 locks at this point. I think 2 of the 4 will definitely get in. Would be surprised if we got all 11 but I could see 10 if marquette or Cinci get some quality wins and get to 10-8. WV can afford to be 8-10 the others probably have to get to 9-9 to feel safe.

There are a lot of things in the big east bubble teams favor 1) extra bubble spots 2) down year in college basketball most notably in other conferences 3) BE great out of conference record 4) Great RPIs

WV can lose a lot of games down the stretch, but their RPI will stay high since they're playing high RPI teams.
BE teams on the bubble all have marquee wins to help their causes:

WV: Gtown, Prudue, Vanderbilt, Duquense( leading A-10), Cleavland st( leading Horizon). If they get to 8-10 they're in with games against Depaul and rutgers left with 6 big east wins already in the bag they seem set. Getting 1 more quality win out of Cuse, ND, pitt, Uconn, or louisville should be do able as well.

St. Johns: Duke, NorthWestern, WV, Gtown, ND but 2 bad losses have an easiest ending schedule if they get to 9-9 they're in with games against Depaul, Seton Hall, and USF they just need to steal 1 from Uconn, cinci, Pitt, nova, Marquette. 8-10 plus a game or 2 in the BET should be enough.

Marquette: Will have a hard time with their tendency to drop close games to better teams missing opportunities vs duke, gonzaga, wisconsin, Vandy, Louisville, ND, and Nova. Still have 3 quality wins in conference play: ND, Cuse, WV.
Have plenty of winnable games left: USF, Providence, Seton Hall X2. They need to get a couple of the hard games to beef up their resume: Gtown, St. Johns, Uconn, Cinci. Need to get to 10-8 or do damage in BET

Cinci: Weakest resume but still have good wins over Dayton, Xavier, St. Johns and no bad losses I think they're most likely to fall off with a tough schedule and weakest wins to date. Need to get to 10-8 or do damage in BET

[DanMcQ]

espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/bubblewatch

[GUJook97]

If WV goes 8-10, it means they are 17-13, and would have lost 7 of their last 10 games. Plus, they'd probably be in 9th/10th place in the BE, playing a bad team on day 1 of the tourney that wont help their resume. That's just not deserving of a spot.

[HoyaSinceBirth]

They no longer use the last 10 games as a metric so in theory how you do down the stretch is irrelevant. Only the whole body of work matters.

8-10 in the big east is equivalent to 12 wins in any other conference. WV will easily have more quality wins than any other bubble teams. I don't think there's any way they're not 9-9 going into the BET anyway, but they'd be more deserving than other teams even if they don't.

[GUJook97]

I am not suggesting that it's a metric, I am just suggesting that it would show that they are not that good. No 17-13, 8-10 team deserves to make the tourney, IMO. When we beat Nova in 2009 to get to 7-10, I dont think beating SJUs to get to 8-10 should have put us in the tourney. We just werent deserving. Just because you beat some teams along the way and have a decent RPI doesnt mean 17-13 is acceptable. Just MO. It's probably a moot point because like you said, there is a lot left to happen.

[Jack]

Feb 8, 2011 10:51:00 GMT -5 GUJook97 said:

I am not suggesting that it's a metric, I am just suggesting that it would show that they are not that good. No 17-13, 8-10 team deserves to make the tourney, IMO. When we beat Nova in 2009 to get to 7-10, I dont think beating SJUs to get to 8-10 should have put us in the tourney. We just werent deserving. Just because you beat some teams along the way and have a decent RPI doesnt mean 17-13 is acceptable. Just MO. It's probably a moot point because like you said, there is a lot left to happen.

I feel like between this thread and the rankings thread debate about the merits of ND, you think there is some sort of Platonic ideal of what a "Number 8 Team" or an "NCAA Tournament Team" looks like. But the fact is there are just the teams this year and they are compared in context to one another, history is not relevant because 68 teams have to make the tournament in 2011.

It may end up that there are too many teams with better resumes to allow for a 8-10/17-13 Big East team to be in the tournament. But its not about whether they were subjectively "deserving" of a spot - unless someone else beats them for the spot, they get a bid, and with a down year in several other conferences and 3 more at-large bids available this year, there is no reason to rule out a team like that now.

[GUJook97]

Huh? I am just doing what everyone else is doing - speculating about what big east teams will make the tournament and which teams are good. There is basically an entire industry that revolves around this very thing. Of course history is relevant, otherwise no bracketologist would have a job.

More to point, I am being more mundane than anyone else. 17-13, 8-10 would be a a crappy, crappy record. That's not some platonic ideal....That just smells like garbage. It would suck if WVU made the tourney, but Utah St lost its conference tourney, finished 25-5 and didnt. Again, it's my opinion.

[lurkerhoya]

As much as I love the BE, an 8-10 conference record is just that. You don't get credit for games you didn't win. SOS as a metric has a place, but it shouldn't be used as a replacement for actually winning those games.

[TrueHoyaBlue]

If WVU goes 8-10 in conference, they've still got wins over Purdue, Vandy, Duquesne and Cleveland St (not too much teams like Georgetown).

They would be in the 40s at worst, RPI-wise, with anywhere from 6-10 Top 50 quality wins (RPI-Top 50).

If you're comparing wins (not just SOS), there's no way that hypothetical WVU team doesn't make the field. If teams like BYU and SDSU should be evaluated for their entire body of work, then so should teams in the BIG EAST, which is what made the conference winning all of those early-season tournaments this year not only impressive, but important.

The fascinating thing about all these bracket projections that show 11 BE teams in the tourney is that almost none of them are seeded 11 or higher, which means there's a lot of cushion below to absorb some losses and still be competitive.

[GUJook97]

Being in the 40s in the RPI isnt all that good, and that's sort of the point. You are talking about a hypothetical 17-13, 8-10, 45 RPI team. How is that not firmly a bubble team?

[TrueHoyaBlue]

68 teams means a top-50 RPI will almost guarantee a spot in the tournament this season.

Oh, it's absolutely a bubble team, but one with a much better profile (5+ top-50 wins) than the other bubble teams it will be compared to. Who else would you slot ahead of them? Cal (1-7 against top 50 teams)? Oklahoma State (1-2 vs. Top 50)? Maryland (0-7 vs. Top 50?).

I do think that WVU would make the tournament at 8-10, but I don't necessarily think that's the case for Marquette, SJU, or Cincy, but that's largely based on the difference in profiles.

I agree that the BIG EAST is not the most-super-awesome-conference-in-the-history-of-college-basketball, but I feel like in this thread and the ND argument, you're putting teams up against a hypothetical standard, not against any of the other teams in college basketball.

[GUJook97]

For one, that's not true. There are only 30 something at larges.

But, the rest of your points are fair. In all honesty, though, my argument is still as simple as lurker's. 8-10 is not deserving. It's very rare that a team with a losing conference record makes the tourney. They may hypothetically beat USF in the first round of the BE, and then lose to Syracuse to finish 9-11. I am sure someone has the numbers, but i would guess it's happened 1 or 2 times that that type of team has made it. This year may be the exception because, like you said, there are 4 more teams, but I still say no.

[hifigator]

I know individual opinions don't mean a whole lot, but the BE is getting tons of love down here, and this certainly isn't BE country. The local and regional sports talk hosts are constantely singing the praises of the BE. I have heard "10 or even 11" teams getting bids multiple times. Just the other day when St. Johns beat Duke, the comments were all about how it really wasn't that much of an upset because the BE is that good. "That a lower-tier BE team could knock off the elite ACC and one of the National elite teams this year is really no surprise. Now you and I already know that, but the recognition is beginning to be accepted. I'm not sure the Dickie V's of the world have accepted it, but thankfully his opinion is meaning less and less each day.

If I had to guess, I would say 10 teams from the BE get in. But if the favorites take care of business in all of the minor conferences and the teams that are getting bids regardless like the Sand Diego St.'s of the world win their conferences, then it wouldn't surprise me to see 11 BE teams get in. The real question however, is how they do the seeding. Because the BE may very well deserve something like 4 of the top 8 and 6 of the top 12 seeds, but are they going to do that? We'll have to see.

[TrueHoyaBlue]

There are 37 at-large teams in the expanded tourney, plus the reasonable assumption that at least 6-10 of the automatic bids (big six conferences, A-10, MWC, CAA, perhaps some others) will be teams that would otherwise be at-larges, freeing up those spots.

I hear you on the "deserving" point, but I think that this year will likely be different because of:
a) the expanded format
b) the fact that there are so many BIG EAST teams that are very strong that it could be possible to go 8-10 with only one (or zero) losses outside the top-30 RPI.

This is all an academic exercise, but i'll give you the points for standing on principle, even if I don't think it bears out in the reality of the field.

[GUJook97]

In the history of the 64 team format, I would guess that 1-2 teams with a losing conference record have ever made the tournament. It's pretty silly to think my position is the one that doesn't bear out the reality of the field. But, I will stand corrected when a Big East team with a losing record makes it.

[Boz]

Feb 8, 2011 14:33:11 GMT -5 GUJook97 said:

In the history of the 64 team format, I would guess that 1-2 teams with a losing conference record have ever made the tournament. It's pretty silly to think my position is the one that doesn't bear out the reality of the field. But, I will stand corrected when a Big East team with a losing record makes it.

That can't be right.

Isn't there, like, a 7-9 ACC team that makes it pretty much every damn year (or is at least one of the last four out)?

Because, of course, the ACC is so unbelievably dreamy and awesome! They could be a third NBA conference.

[lurkerhoya]

Hifi's point about favorites in the mid-majors is, to me, the biggest hurdle. The field was expanded obviously for money, but my gut feeling is that the Committee is going to see it as an invitation for bringing in more mid-majors. This will especially be true if a team like Oakland loses their tournament in the finals. Maybe they're not really a deserving team, but I could see them getting a nod over the BE's 9th or 10th team politically.

[GUJook97]

You might be right, there might have been a few ACC teams that made it.

[lurkerhoya]

Feb 8, 2011 14:42:03 GMT -5 Boz said:

Feb 8, 2011 14:33:11 GMT -5 GUJook97 said:

In the history of the 64 team format, I would guess that 1-2 teams with a losing conference record have ever made the tournament. It's pretty silly to think my position is the one that doesn't bear out the reality of the field. But, I will stand corrected when a Big East team with a losing record makes it.

That can't be right.

Isn't there, like, a 7-9 ACC team that makes it pretty much every damn year (or is at least one of the last four out)?

Because, of course, the ACC is so unbelievably dreamy and awesome! They could be a third NBA conference.

I'll mention Georgia Tech last year before it bites me in the ass again. But they did make a run to the ACC finals and lost by 4 to Duke.

[rosslynhoya]

Feb 8, 2011 14:48:49 GMT -5 lurkerhoya said:

Hifi's point about favorites in the mid-majors is, to me, the biggest hurdle. The field was expanded obviously for money, but my gut feeling is that the Committee is going to see it as an invitation for bringing in more mid-majors. This will especially be true if a team like Oakland loses their tournament in the finals. Maybe they're not really a deserving team, but I could see them getting a nod over the BE's 9th or 10th team politically.

But hifi's point misses the point: there are NO mid-major faves this year. None. That's why 10-11 Big East teams are likely to get in. The major conferences, Mountain West, A-10, CAA, and maybe perhaps C-USA (did I miss any?) are the only conferences that will feature an at-large bid. The rest are all one-bid conferences, period, with no favorites who need to "take care of business" to create room on the bubble. So it boils down to a question of whether you'd rather have the 12th best Big East team or the 4th best ACC/SEC/B10 team in your field of 68.