The Season is Clearly Over.... (latest bracketology)

[XfansinKy]

It's been a rocky season so far but this team has enough talent to do some damage in March. Survive the Big East gauntlet, get into the dance and see what kind of run they can put together. That's the thing with the NCAA Tourney - if you get the right draw a deep run is quite feasible.

Simply put and 100% correct.

[muethibp]

This bubble team stuff is hilarious. Do you know how soft the bubble is since they expanded to 68 teams? It's a joke.

They've got 14 wins and 2 games left against Depaul. That's 16 wins.

They have seven games where they should be able to find 3, maybe 4 wins: @ UC, @ St. Johns, Seton Hall, @ Providence, @ Marquette, @ Seton Hall

So even assuming they lose again to Creighton, Butler, and Villanova (and they will be in all three games), they still should make it. This is not a bubble team, at least not yet.

[AviatorX]

This bubble team stuff is hilarious. Do you know how soft the bubble is since they expanded to 68 teams? It's a joke.

They've got 14 wins and 2 games left against Depaul. That's 16 wins.

They have seven games where they should be able to find 3, maybe 4 wins: @ UC, @ St. Johns, Seton Hall, @ Providence, @ Marquette, @ Seton Hall

So even assuming they lose again to Creighton, Butler, and Villanova (and they will be in all three games), they still should make it. This is not a bubble team, at least not yet.

Yeah, I mean at this point if Xavier is a bubble team Duke is as well.

[mirabilelectu]

This bubble team stuff is hilarious. Do you know how soft the bubble is since they expanded to 68 teams? It's a joke.

They've got 14 wins and 2 games left against Depaul. That's 16 wins.

They have seven games where they should be able to find 3, maybe 4 wins: @ UC, @ St. Johns, Seton Hall, @ Providence, @ Marquette, @ Seton Hall

So even assuming they lose again to Creighton, Butler, and Villanova (and they will be in all three games), they still should make it. This is not a bubble team, at least not yet.

I think it's very clear that our resume is not bubbly. I think what some people, at least I understand some people to be saying (maybe I'm giving them too much credit) is that this team will end up a bubble team if they don't eliminate some of the troubling trends. If we lose to Nova, CU, and Butler then we also have to hope we don't slip up against SJU or DePaul as we will have no opportunities for good wins and will have to start avoiding bad losses. Do you really feel comfortable predicting wins on the road even against those teams? I don't feel as comfortable as some with regards to chalking up wins; Butler has struggled with both DePaul and SJU, DePaul also played very well in Philly, Marquette just hung 100 in Omaha (we didn't even put up 70 in Cintas!). I agree, more likely than not we will pick up enough wins, but to just assume we will end up in the tournament because we are comfortably in now is shortsighted. We are in the driver's seat right now which is awesome, but they need to get the job done.

[GoMuskies]

I don't think we're likely to be bubbly. I'm just afraid we're going to end up with a shitty seed having not shown the ability to beat the kind of team we'd have to beat in the second round to get to the Sweet Sixteen. If we can get by what will likely be a difficult opening round opponent.

[THRILLHOUSE]

Looks like basketball is kind of following in football's steps - There is going to be an in-season unveiling of the Top 16 seeds on February 11th:

http://www.cbspressexpress.com/cbs-s.../view?id=46919

[GoMuskies]

Looks like basketball is kind of following in football's steps - There is going to be an in-season unveiling of the Top 16 seeds on February 11th:

http://www.cbspressexpress.com/cbs-s.../view?id=46919

That is really dumb.

[xufan2434]

That is really dumb.

I guess the point is to give teams falling in the 1-3 seed range more of an idea of where they are heading into the tournament? I'm not sure. Seems more to me that outside of just getting people to talk about college ball, it's more a way for the committee to be protected come S Sunday since people will know where they've been coming from for the last month.

To me, there's so much that can change between 3-6 seeds in the last couple weeks. You can go from a 6 to 3/4 just by winning your conference tournament in some cases. So kind of seems stupid to do prior to March

[JTG]

I guess the point is to give teams falling in the 1-3 seed range more of an idea of where they are heading into the tournament? I'm not sure. Seems more to me that outside of just getting people to talk about college ball, it's more a way for the committee to be protected come S Sunday since people will know where they've been coming from for the last month.

To me, there's so much that can change between 3-6 seeds in the last couple weeks. You can go from a 6 to 3/4 just by winning your conference tournament in some cases. So kind of seems stupid to do prior to March

It's marketing: Get people talking about college basketball. What dominates sports media for 2 days after selection Sunday, who is slotted where. Strictly a marketing ploy, and a smart one at that

[xubrew]

Looks like basketball is kind of following in football's steps - There is going to be an in-season unveiling of the Top 16 seeds on February 11th:

http://www.cbspressexpress.com/cbs-s.../view?id=46919

That is really dumb.

From a programming perspective, it's ingenious.

There is some sort of intrinsic excitement when it comes to brackets, even among people that are just casual fans at best. I can't really explain why, but I can't really explain Christmas either. There is something intrinsic about it and when see the lights and the decorations they kind of get caught up in it. I've thought for a long time that a really easy way for CBS/Turner, or ESPN, or both to create a show that's unbelievably easy to produce and that tons of people would watch is to have a half hour every Sunday night where they reveal that week's bracket projections before they just post it online. That's basically what this is, only the real selection committee is coming up with the top four lines.

I kind of like it. Tons of people will watch this half hour show, and it gives us a pretty good checkpoint of where teams currently stand, at least when it comes to the top four seeds.