ESPN Bracketology

[oklahomamick]

Those seeds are all on speculation that we win our tournament.  We may get a 12 seed but we have to win our tournament, otherwise it's no seed.  We could win the rest of our games and lose the last one.... 

[justducky]

Well at least we needn't worry about being an 8 or 9. I would have hated winning out then being rewarded with one of those when we could have deserved a 6 or 7. A 10 11, 12 even a 13 suits me just fine from a competitive standpoint. Or we might go into an Oakland like tailspin.    Oh please don't send us to the NIT even if we could win the whole thing!

[agibson]

[tweet]690763256252743680[/tweet]
[tweet]690764360583663616[/tweet]

You could read that two ways.  And, it's hard to know if Lunardi had the Wright State loss in mind, or not, when he posted his S-curve not too long after the game and had us #41, somewhere around the top edge of "last four in".

I'm choosing to think that he meant, "win out, lose in the tournament final, and they've still got some shot at an at-large."  Of course, what does Lunardi know?

[justducky]

I'm choosing to think that he meant, "win out, lose in the tournament final, and they've still got some shot at an at-large."  Of course, what does Lunardi know?

My thoughts well before tonight were that a 17-1 conference record with a championship game loss at Detroit would still have us is contention for an at-large. Some decent wins with only 5 losses would certainly still have us in the conversation. That said our chances would be maybe 35 or 40% and the inevitable "who did they beat?" would be asked. In that light the ref tripping incident at Oregon St could be enormous.

[historyman]

Of course, what does Lunardi know?

I've been saying the same thing ever since he started doing brackets for ESPN. What makes Lunardi so much better than anyone else at predicting brackets? He simply isn't.

[StlVUFan]

Of course, what does Lunardi know?

I've been saying the same thing ever since he started doing brackets for ESPN. What makes Lunardi so much better than anyone else at predicting brackets? He simply isn't.

[historyman]

Of course, what does Lunardi know?

I've been saying the same thing ever since he started doing brackets for ESPN. What makes Lunardi so much better than anyone else at predicting brackets? He simply isn't.

I though it only appropriate to give you the clap-----also.

[agibson]

Lunardi's bracket came out Monday.  10 seed against Dayton in St. Louis.

Ahead of ~5 at-large teams.

[StlVUFan]

Lunardi's bracket came out Monday.  10 seed against Dayton in St. Louis.

Ahead of ~5 at-large teams.

That would be awesome, except for the mid-on-mid violence, of course

[agibson]

That would be awesome, except for the mid-on-mid violence, of course

It seems remarkably common for Valpo, in his brackets.

Dayton, Wichita State, a month ago it was Gonzaga.  Three for seven, anyway.  I assume that's well above average for the #4-7 lines our opponents have been on.

[talksalot]

so... being the planner... I went to the NCAA tournament site to look at ticket availability... YIKES !

Nose-Bleed baseline upper upper upper deck at:

Des Moines:  $225 PER TICKET for Day 1 Session 1  (that's two games)

St. Louis:  $198 PER TICKET for Day 1 Session 1

I stopped looking...   I'm hoping that includes some serious broker-fee that would not be charged if we get into the Participating Team Ticket Pool.

[a3uge]

so... being the planner... I went to the NCAA tournament site to look at ticket availability... YIKES !

Nose-Bleed baseline upper upper upper deck at:

Des Moines:  $225 PER TICKET for Day 1 Session 1  (that's two games)

St. Louis:  $198 PER TICKET for Day 1 Session 1

I stopped looking...   I'm hoping that includes some serious broker-fee that would not be charged if we get into the Participating Team Ticket Pool.

On seatgeek.com they have upstairs corner seats (where the section was in Columbus) for $140 (incl fees) in Des Moines for section 1. But from there prices skyrocket.

Session 1 for St Louis has seats in the lower bowl for $96 including fees and even has a center court lower bowl seat for $203.

Tickets through Valpo last year were $95, but again, those seats were pretty bad.

Also, it depends on the matchup too. I went to the Championship Game for $177 and sat in the 2nd deck next to some SMU assistants. If you time it right, you can get a good deal!

[agibson]

Funny, I've been looking at Copa America tickets - tournament in June.  They're barely on sale yet, only the first couple of advanced pools are in.

I've been thinking about Horizon League tournament tickets - again, only 4-day tickets on sale at this point.

It hadn't occurred to me that NCAA tickets were already on sale. Looks like it started in October.  I know Ticketmaster does secondary market stuff now too... I can't quite tell, are those prices face value?  Looks like it might be.

I guess it makes sense if you're a local and just want to see some good basketball.  I wonder how many fans buy up tickets to a variety of sites, planning to sell off the ones where their team isn't playing?

I'd looked at the options a while back, considered the sites I'd be willing to get to on short notice (e.g. drive), what days of the week I could conceivably drop everything to get away, etc, etc.  It didn't look likely for the first/second round, for sure. 

But, I'd not even thought about buying the tickets months in advance... Before any of the teams were announced.

What did I pay for the sweet sixteen in St. Louis in the 90's?  $50 per seat?  Not more than $100, I'm pretty sure.  But, it was a long time ago.  It did seem border-line exorbitant at the time.  And the seats were _not_ good.

[agibson]

On seatgeek.com they have upstairs corner seats (where the section was in Columbus) for $140 (incl fees) in Des Moines for section 1. But from there prices skyrocket.

Session 1 for St Louis has seats in the lower bowl for $96 including fees and even has a center court lower bowl seat for $203.

Now I'm pretty confused by the pricing.

I had just about convinced myself that the "Get Tickets" links from
http://www.ncaa.com/tickets/basketball-men/d1
were for retail pricing.

And that the Ticketmaster secondary market was the "Experience/Exchange" link from that page.

But the retail prices from ncaa.com seem well above what you mentioned...

Anyone know the story here?

[a3uge]

On seatgeek.com they have upstairs corner seats (where the section was in Columbus) for $140 (incl fees) in Des Moines for section 1. But from there prices skyrocket.

Session 1 for St Louis has seats in the lower bowl for $96 including fees and even has a center court lower bowl seat for $203.

Now I'm pretty confused by the pricing.

I had just about convinced myself that the "Get Tickets" links from
http://www.ncaa.com/tickets/basketball-men/d1
were for retail pricing.

And that the Ticketmaster secondary market was the "Experience/Exchange" link from that page.

But the retail prices from ncaa.com seem well above what you mentioned...

Anyone know the story here?

I get why you're confused - Ticketmaster is the official ticket broker for the NCAA. They sell face value tickets for the tournament games. They also have a ticket exchange where anyone who owns a ticket can sell through their marketplace.

There's also popular reseller sites like StubHub or Ticket City, where, again, anyone can sell their tickets and the website takes a cut of their sale.

My recommended site:

http://seatgeek.com/

Best user interface and you can see if the seat is a good deal or not. It combines tickets from 4 or 5 reseller sites and you see tickets with fees included. Ticketmaster will have up to 20% fees that aren't listed until after you've entered your credit card and are about to click submit! StubHub finally went the fees included route.

[agibson]

My recommended site:

http://seatgeek.com/

Noted, I'll keep it in mind.

I have some idea of the various primary and secondary market options.  But, I think I found my mistake.  By default the NCAA page was giving me "all session" tickets, and I was comparing those prices to your session 1 prices from seatgeek.  Probably talksalot's prices were also "all session" tickets?  An "all session" St. Louis ticket would be, what, six games?

$198 (albeit before fees) doesn't sound so bad, in principle, for six games.  Cheaper than I'd have expected, in fact.  So, maybe I still have it wrong!  But, at least, Seat Geek's prices for those tickets are higher, as you might expect.

[talksalot]

I went to OK City in "the year"... without a ticket, got one from a scalper 10 minutes before tip... for $10... got in the building, sat in the 4th row behind the team bench down the row from Gene Bartow.

Those were the days...

[oklahomamick]

My father and I went to the game.  I was very young and barely remember.  I didn't think anything of it at the time and then 10 years later I received a recruiting letter from Valpo.  Valpo was not in my top 5 but my Dad talked me into taking an official visit and the rest is history. 

[VULB#62]

Jan 28:  USAToday  has Valpo as a #10 seed and playing #7 seed Duke in the East Region in NYC.

[vu84v2]

The NCAA's preference to get teams that are among the top 5 seeds closer to their home is what is driving up ticket prices. Iowa and Iowa State fans both can make a reasonable assumption of being a 1 through 4 seed and playing at Des Moines.  While there are other reasonably close options for Kansas, St. Louis is still a probable place for Kansas and is the very likely place for Kentucky if they are a 1 through 4 seed.

Some really unfortunate 10 or 11 seed team will probably get Duke in Raleigh.

[talksalot]

Nah... the #4 Tarheels will get that slot... Duke will be "Sent Packing"...

[Kyle321n]

Going back to 1979 Duke's lowest seeds were the 2007's 6th seed vs VCU when they were sent packing to Buffalo and 1996's 8th seed vs EMU in Indianapolis

[StlVUFan]

Tickets through Valpo last year were $95, but again, those seats were pretty bad.

I thought they were pretty good myself.

[UConnHoops]

https://www.teamrankings.com/ncaa-basketball/team/valparaiso-crusaders/bracketology

[agibson]

https://www.teamrankings.com/ncaa-basketball/team/valparaiso-crusaders/bracketology

Yeah, they're the guys that _really_ like us.  Have been a 6 or a 7 there consistently.

Though, to my surprise, they're not our high currently
http://bracketmatrix.com/
has a six too.  And several 9's.  Average of 10.7, slipping a bit to the last of the 11 lines.  But still ahead of two at-larges.