ESPN Bracketology

[valpotx]

Quit with this BS thread predicting anything higher than a 12 seed.  It wasn't going to happen.

[bbtds]

Did I miss the transition? It seems like we jumped from "always 41" on Lunardi's curve all the way to 35, deep into the at-large spots.

[tweet]698520393469009920[/tweet]

And several hours later Valpo will jump right back to 41 or lower.

[justducky]

Quit with this BS thread predicting anything higher than a 12 seed.  It wasn't going to happen.

It could have happened.

Now I am concerned that a late season tailspin might turn us into a 2 or 3 seed in the NIT.       Individual and team confidence is a very important and very fragile thing. How Bryce harnesses this setback into the team approach could determine the next 5 weeks of basketball.

Why did I wake up thinking about Feb of 2011?

[Kyle321n]

Well that loss certainly hurt our seedline, funnily enough we didn't change who we'd play in the second round. We're still above the cut for an at large if we weren't the leader of the conference. That said, another loss certainly will take us out of the at large position, so we need to win the conference tourney.



You can click on the image to make it bigger. We're the 10 seed in the top left bracket and playing Texas. We get the winner of Maryland-UAB

My first 8 out teams
Pittsburgh
South Dakota St.
Florida St.
St. Mary's
Butler
Oregon St.
Alabama
BYU

Automatic Qualifiers: Villanova, Kansas, North Carolina, Iowa, Kentucky, Arizona, Dayton, Wichita St., Monmouth, Gonzaga, Arkansas Little Rock, Valparaiso, Chattanooga, Stony Brook, Yale, Akron, San Diego St., UNC Wilmington, Hawaii, Temple, Stephen F. Austin, IPFW, UAB, Belmont, New Mexico St., UNC Asheville, Montana, Bucknell, Hampton, Texas Southern, Fairleigh Dickinson, Jacksonville

[agibson]

And several hours later Valpo will jump right back to 41 or lower.

Could be about right. In ESPN's update today we're a 12 seed playing Duke in Denver (with a 12/12 play-in game).

Certainly stings to see St. Mary's an at-large (12 play-in), Gonzaga a 9, Wichita State an 8, Monmouth a 10. 

Time to get back on our horse...

[bbtds]

Time to get back on our horse...

Are you saying we could get back on our horse by playing the Norse?

[historyman]

Time to get back on our horse...

Are you saying we could get back on our horse by playing the Norse?

I have a feeling that was a joke made bad by force. (horse...Norse...force, see it rhymes. Oh nevermind.)

[VUSWIM08-12]

Eamonn Brennan on the  latest bracketology update "We hate to do it, but Valparaiso's home loss to Wright State on Saturday earns it the boot from this space and probably from serious at-large consideration moving forward. The Crusaders are a good team, and good teams sometimes lose games at home. See Maryland on Saturday night. But the Crusaders' resume is not so good that it can withstand a damaging L like that, especially not on their home floor."

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

[Kyle321n]

Just want to say, my top 12 seeds are all locks according to ESPN. And only one team outside of my top 12 is a lock (Dayton, though I agree wholeheartedly that Dayton is a lock). Good to see my formula is working!

[Kyle321n]

There was a TON of upheavel yesterday. The top 4 stayed the same, but the 2-4 seeds had some big changes. This has been a fun exercise for me to see where one game might affect quite a few seeds. There's a new feature for the K.Y.L.E. bracketology, the big movers and dropped out and new additions from the last edition. The movers are based on their spot on my s-curve. Figure a movement of 2 or 3 spots is 1 seed line, 4-7 is 2 seed lines and 8+ is 3 or more seed lines. Again, the image is clickable for you all to look at it bigger.

Dropped out
St. Bonaventure, Vanderbilt, IPFW, FAIRLEIGH DICKINSON, JACKSONVILLE

New Additions
Alabama, Pittsburgh, SOUTH DAKOTA ST., NORTH FLORIDA, WAGNER

Big Movers Up			Big Movers Down
AKRON	10		Colorado	-9
VCU	9		IOWA	-8
Seton Hall	7		North Carolina	-6
STEPHEN F. AUSTIN	7		South Carolina	-6
YALE	6		Syracuse	-5
UAB	5		Michigan	-5
Xavier	4		Wisconsin	-4
KENTUCKY	4		NEW MEXICO ST.	-4
Texas Tech	4		STONY BROOK	-3
BUCKNELL	4		California	-3

Last 8 out
Butler
St. Mary's
Vanderbilt
Oregon St.
George Washington
Florida St.
BYU
St. Bonaventure

[Kyle321n]

I'm not going to republish, (I'll try to keep it to Mondays and Thursdays) but I've been updating my bracket daily (I almost have it completely automated, if only the one site I use to pull some data pulled names the same way as the RPI names pull... bastards.) and Valpo moved up 4 spots on the s-curve and is now a 9 seed playing Wichita with Oklahoma waiting in the wings. Holy crap would that be a fun test for our guards, Van Vleet and Baker and if we get past them Buddy Hield. Tevonn would give 2 inches to Buddy and Baker, but oh the battles would be glorious.

Our good friends a car trip south on I-65 are currently the last team in and play Michigan in the 12 game thanks to Wisconsin's loss last night. A trip down the toll road gets us to the 5 seed playing Akron. We've got some really good midwest games and would be fun to watch. That said the bracket's going to get nuts this weekend.

[vu84v2]

Wichita State and then Oklahoma would likely be in Oklahoma City. That would not be a good situation.

[Kyle321n]

Is that any better than Texas and Maryland in Raleigh, NC? That's where we were previously.

[oklahomamick]

Wichita State and then Oklahoma would likely be in Oklahoma City. That would not be a good situation.

love it.  and remember the shot happened in OKC.

[VULB#62]

I'm not going to republish, (I'll try to keep it to Mondays and Thursdays) but I've been updating my bracket daily (I almost have it completely automated, if only the one site I use to pull some data pulled names the same way as the RPI names pull... bastards.) and Valpo moved up 4 spots on the s-curve and is now a 9 seed playing Wichita with Oklahoma waiting in the wings. Holy crap would that be a fun test for our guards, Van Vleet and Baker and if we get past them Buddy Hield. Tevonn would give 2 inches to Buddy and Baker, but oh the battles would be glorious.

Our good friends a car trip south on I-65 are currently the last team in and play Michigan in the 12 game thanks to Wisconsin's loss last night. A trip down the toll road gets us to the 5 seed playing Akron. We've got some really good midwest games and would be fun to watch. That said the bracket's going to get nuts this weekend.

Kyle - General question on the selection process.  I would have thought that all 1st round games (i.e., the play-in games) should be for the 16 seed.  But they are all over the place (16, 11, 12).  Why is that? 

[ValpoHoops]

There are two play-in games (from now on officially known as "First Four") that are for the last four teams on the seed list (16's)

There are two that are for the "last four in", so they get slotted in at the back end of the at large pool, in the area of 11-12-13.

[a3uge]

I'm not going to republish, (I'll try to keep it to Mondays and Thursdays) but I've been updating my bracket daily (I almost have it completely automated, if only the one site I use to pull some data pulled names the same way as the RPI names pull... bastards.) and Valpo moved up 4 spots on the s-curve and is now a 9 seed playing Wichita with Oklahoma waiting in the wings. Holy crap would that be a fun test for our guards, Van Vleet and Baker and if we get past them Buddy Hield. Tevonn would give 2 inches to Buddy and Baker, but oh the battles would be glorious.

Our good friends a car trip south on I-65 are currently the last team in and play Michigan in the 12 game thanks to Wisconsin's loss last night. A trip down the toll road gets us to the 5 seed playing Akron. We've got some really good midwest games and would be fun to watch. That said the bracket's going to get nuts this weekend.

Kyle - General question on the selection process.  I would have thought that all 1st round games (i.e., the play-in games) should be for the 16 seed.  But they are all over the place (16, 11, 12).  Why is that?

I can try to answer that.

The selection committee first ranks every team in the field, regardless of their auto-bid status. The First 4 (play-in games) are the last 4 at-large bids. Say if Valpo, Monmouth, Stony Brook and a slew of strong auto-bids are deemed better than Butler and Washington (bubble teams), Valpo and the other mid major auto bids would have an 11 seed and Butler, Washington would play each other for the 12 seed.

Then geography can shift teams up or down a couple seeds as well.

Finally, the last 4 automatic bids play in 16vs16 seed games.

[agibson]

And several hours later Valpo will jump right back to 41 or lower.

Could be about right. In ESPN's update today we're a 12 seed playing Duke in Denver (with a 12/12 play-in game).

Certainly stings to see St. Mary's an at-large (12 play-in), Gonzaga a 9, Wichita State an 8, Monmouth a 10. 

Time to get back on our horse...

We're back up to an 11 for Lunardi, aganist Texas A&M. The at-large play-in games are both 12-12 this time (including Butler).

[Kyle321n]

From 2001 to 2010 the bracket was 65 teams and they had the "play in" game for 16 seeds. In 2011 they expanded the field to the 68 it is today and created the "First Round" which is now the "First Four" (the first round is back to being the round of 64). It's always had 2 games of 16 seeds with other seed lines playing the other games.

2011: 11 seeds and 12 seeds
2012: 12 seeds and 14 seeds
2013: 11 seeds and 13 seeds
2014: 11 seeds and 12 seeds
2015: Two games of 11 seeds

I've found there's a bit of a break in the autoqualifiers that allows me to seed the 13s to 16s straight and then throw in the remaining AQs in with the at large bids. Right now the best 13 seeds (Yale and Stony Brook) are 47 and 49 on my s-curve so they are getting seeded down one line for my laziness. Everyone else is below the at large bids on the s-curve.

I also think it's just easier to put the bottom 11 seeds and the bottom 12 seeds and have them face each other for s-curve purposes. Not exactly scientific, but bracketology isn't a science, it's performance art. When my final bracket comes out I'm going to take match ups into consideration, so we don't get first or second round rematches, actually put locations as where I think teams will play and place the play-in games on the seed lines they belong on. If we get a lot of upsets in the minor and mid-majors and have 22 teams with rankings on my s-curve of over 50 then we're going to have play in games at the 11 seed. If it's under 14 teams then the play in games will be down around the 13 line. The conference championships are going to have a lot to do with where I place the "first four" games.

[Kyle321n]

In case anyone was curious for our esteemed conference mates Oakland and Green Bay would be 15 seeds and everyone else would be a 16 seed. Granted a lot is going to change and if they won the tourney they may be boosted a seed. Right now Wright St and Milwaukee have the best odds of moving off the 16 line. Everyone else is basically SWAC level and would be lucky if they aren't in the first four.

[oklahomamick]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaab/2016/02/21/ncaa-tournament-bracketology-bubble-teams-college-basketball-march-madness/80699606/

USA today has us as a 12 playing Arizona in Denver.  Would rather trade with 12 seeds with Arkansas Little Rock against Texas.  We would match up with Texas better. 

[oklahomamick]

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/bracketology/_/iteration/230

Espn has us a 12 against Duke in Denver.  That would be cool.

[elephtheria47]

It took a little while, but Shaka finally got Texas on the right path. I think they will be a tough out in the tourney IMO

[oklahomamick]

No doubt Texas is good.  I like our match up with the guards.  Plus we have luck in OKC. 

[Kyle321n]

So I'm currently trying to put together the bracket without having second round rematches, ala the real bracket, as opposed to a straight S-Curve. There are too many Big 10 teams and ACC schools. That damn challenge is causing all sorts of S-Curve silliness. Throw in the SEC-Big 12 challenge and these major conferences are too incestuous.