No cutesy image this time. Let’s just get to it.
The biggest result of the first half of the final week of the regular season, interestingly, is probably Cal’s five-set win over Utah. The Bears dropped the first two sets before rallying to win a 15-13 squeaker in the fifth. And it’s important not because beating Utah is any great accomplishment, but because it puts the Bears a match over .500. You have to be at least .500 to be eligible for an at-large tournament bid, and the Bears have one more regular-season match before Selection Sunday.
That last opponent? Um….Stanford. So yeah. Going one match over .500 right now is big for this team.
Another big result out of the Pac-12 had Arizona State defeating Washington in four sets, at Washington. This gives the Sun Devils wins over UW and UCLA this season, and their most conference wins ever. I feel much better about including them in the field now. And you can’t say Washington had nothing to play for in this match, because they did. Had they won out, they would have had a good chance to get the #4 overall tournament seed, which means no running into Penn State, Stanford, or Texas prior to the Final Four, and that’s big. A lot of teams want that spot (though in actuality two teams will get such a road to Louisville, as the #5 overall seed will go into the same regional). The Huskies may still wind up in the Nebraska regional (Penn State will go to Purdue, Stanford to Cal, and Texas will be in their home regional), but they’ve severely hurt their chances.
Down at the bottom of the bracket, Missouri has played themselves out with an ugly three-set loss to fellow bubble-dwellers Kentucky. They’ve got the weakest RPI of any team in the SEC that harbors realistic tournament aspirations, so as of right now I’ve got them on the outside looking in. They’ve still got a chance to leave a good last impression on the selection committee, with a final regular-season match against Alabama tomorrow. But I’ve never been entirely comfortable with the SEC getting 6 bids, and now they’ve got 5.
The beneficiaries in this bracket are the Xavier Musketeers. You might criticize me for not going with one of my ‘First Four Out’ teams from Sunday’s bracket, and that’d be fair. But in my mind, those teams are OUT. There are other teams that I maybe have not given full consideration to. It’s something to keep in mind for next season (remember this is my first time doing this) — ranking more than just the top 40 or so at-large teams. Maybe go down to 60-65 for next year, so I have a fuller picture of the bubble.
But, Xavier. They play in a fair conference, the A-10, and the only team they’ve lost to since the beginning of October is the team that ran the table in the A-10, Dayton. They faced four likely tournament teams in their non-conference and lost to all four, though they did extend Notre Dame to five sets. They’ve beaten the teams they should beat, though, and I just don’t feel the same can be said of lesser teams from the big conferences like Missouri or Georgia Tech or Northwestern.
Oh, and about Georgia Tech. That ACC ‘play-in’ match I talked about in Sunday’s bracketology went to Clemson in a pretty convincing three-set sweep, so the Tigers are in and the Yellowjackets are out.
Here goes.
SEEDS
1. Penn State
2. Stanford
3. Texas
4. Louisville
5. USC
6. Oregon
7. UCLA
8. Washington
9. Florida
10. Hawaii
11. Minnesota
12. Nebraska
13. Florida State
14. Ohio State
15. Dayton
16. BYU
LAST FOUR TEAMS IN:
1. Xavier
2. Wichita State
3. Clemson
4. California
FIRST FOUR TEAMS OUT:
1. Missouri
2. Georgia Tech
3. Northwestern
4. Santa Clara
NEXT FOUR TEAMS OUT:
1. Ohio
2. Towson
3. Baylor
4. Southern Illinois
Underlined teams are automatic qualifiers. BYU gets the WCC’s automatic bid on a complicated tiebreaker with San Diego. They finished with the same conference record, split their head-to-head meetings, and had the same results against common opponents. It came down to total sets won head-to-head. When BYU beat San Diego, they won 3-1. When San Diego beat BYU, it was 3-2. So since BYU won 5 total sets head-to-head and San Diego only 4, the Cougars get the automatic bid. It’s a technicality, anyway; either school would have been a cinch for an at-large bid.
PURDUE REGIONAL
(1) Penn State vs. Jackson State
Notre Dame vs. Pepperdine
Purdue vs. Tulsa
(16) BYU vs. IPFW
(9) Florida vs. LIU-Brooklyn
North Carolina vs. Arizona State
Tennessee vs. North Carolina State
(8) Washington vs. East Tennessee State
NEBRASKA REGIONAL
(5) USC vs. Maryland-Eastern Shore
Creighton vs. Colorado State
Iowa State vs. Central Arkansas
(12) Nebraska vs. New Mexico State
(13) Florida State vs. Cleveland State
Texas A&M vs. Wichita State
Northern Iowa vs. Oklahoma
(4) Louisville vs. Belmont
TEXAS REGIONAL
(3) Texas vs. Colgate
Arkansas vs. Michigan
Miami vs. California
(14) Ohio State vs. Yale
(11) Minnesota vs. Portland State
San Diego vs. Xavier
Kansas State vs. St. Mary’s
(6) Oregon vs. Hofstra
CALIFORNIA REGIONAL
(7) UCLA vs. Fairfield
Marquette vs. San Diego State
Western Kentucky vs. Bowling Green (second time this matchup has popped up in one of my brackets, and now I’m really hoping it happens :p )
(10) Hawaii vs. Liberty
(15) Dayton vs. College of Charleston
Kansas vs. Clemson
Michigan State vs. Kentucky
(2) Stanford vs. Binghamton
CONFERENCES BY NUMBER OF BIDS
7 – Big Ten, Pac-12
5 – Atlantic Coast, Big 12, Southeastern
4 – West Coast
3 – Big East, Missouri Valley
2 – Atlantic-10, Mountain West
1 – Other 21 conferences
I’m now anxiously awaiting Selection Sunday to see how I’m doing here just as much as to see what the actual seedings and pairings will be. I think I’m doing okay for a rookie bracketologist, but there’s really only one way to know. And it won’t be long now.
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