Hitting a new bracketologic low

With all the bad news, I was hoping that I would at least get my predictions right for this year's NCAA men's-basketball tournament.  No such luck.  My primary bracket fell completely apart, with the right side almost completely wiped out.   Among the actual eighth-finalists in the Southwest and East regions, I correctly picked only Kansas.  I've never had a bracket fall apart like that on the first weekend.  I also picked Richmond in a secondary bracket, but that one has sucked, too.

The only comfort is that with the vaunted Big East crapping out so thoroughly, not many other people have decent brackets this year.   Bleah.

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Someone proven worse than Dick Vitale

I don't know why I bother watching the men's basketball games ESPN puts on its marquee.   Within a few minutes of tuning in, Dick Vitale, Jeff van Gundy or Bobby Knight will utter something so mind-numblingly stupid, I have to punch a button on the clicker.

During tonight's Kansas State-Texas game, Knight went off on his sideline colleague.  All poor Holly Rowe did was remark that some player told his coach "my bad" in response to a mistake he made on the court.  "I know that," sneered Knight, as though saying "my bad" were a cardinal sin.  Even when he was still head coach at Indiana University (and I actually admired him!), he would fault his young players for not taking responsibility for their mistakes.  What does he do now?  Criticize young players for admitting they made a mistake.  [Thank Jeebus for Rachel Maddow.  I had somewhere to click to.]

It's power trips like this that have reduced one of the sport's greatest coaches to an arrogant, unlistenable snot.  No one knew it when it went down in 1985, but here's the moment Bobby Knight's status as a public figure jumped the shark:

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While I'm here, I might as well post the highlights of the men's bracket I updated today.

• There aren't as many cute early matchups as last week, and only one (BYU-Utah State) that's a replay of a regular season game.  But I have sent Ohio State, Xavier and Cincinnati all to the same octave.  They all play in Cleveland, but only one can advance to the regional semifinals.
• As I thought might happen, the Big Ten contingent is shrinking, from seven teams to five.
• First Four games:  Florida Atlantic-Hampton, Texas Southern-McNeese State, Marquette-Richmond, Wichita State-Washington. 
• At-large changes from last week's bracket:  Virginia Tech replaces Boston College, Richmond replaces Colorado State, Gonzaga replaces Minnesota, Wichita State replaces Penn State.

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Bricketology™ 2011: Abu Scooter's first women's cut

Yesterday was the guys' turn; today, I'm predicting the NCAA women's basketball bracket.  The process for the women is completely different from what's used to set up the men's bracket.   Here are the differences:

1. The women's bracket has only 64 teams.  No one gets a bye, and there are no play-in games.
2. Regions are named after their locations instead of compass directions: this year, Dallas, Dayton, Spokane and Philadelphia.
3. The women's selection committee tends to just pick the best 64 teams, then assign their places in order of rank.  This year, for example, the top five teams are (and will probably remain) UConn, Stanford, Duke, Baylor and Tennessee.  Four of those teams will get the #1 seeds and be placed in the bracket; the one that's left will be placed next, as a #2 seed.  Texas A&M and Xavier, the probable sixth and seventh selections, will be placed after that.  And so it goes, down the the 64th best team.  On the men's side, it's chaos, once the first 16 or so teams are picked.
4. Maximizing attendance remains a priority on the women's side, so if a qualifier can open at home, it does, regardless of seed.  For the same reason, no team will travel across the continent for the regional-level playoffs, if it can be avoided.  Contrast that with the process for the men's bracket, where home-court advantages are expressly prohibited.

 Some constraints apply on both sides of the gender line.

1. There are 31 automatic bids, one for each conference. The Ivy League picks its representative based on regular-season play; everyone else uses a post-season tournament.
2. When four or fewer teams are selected from any league, they are placed in different regions.  For 5-8 teams, it's one or two to a region.
3. Conference rivals can meet before the regional final only if more than eight teams advance.  Non-conference matchups that have occurred during the regular season are also to be avoided.

 The only other thing to add is that, as with the men's bracket, I rely more heavily on RPI rankings than the selection committees will. I'm also pretty hostile to teams with losing conference records (buh-bye, Texas).  Here are the highlights of my women's bracket. If you're wondering about your favorite team, and I haven't mentioned it, just ask about it in the comments.

• Top seeds: UConn (Philadelphia), Stanford (Spokane), Tennessee (Dayton), Baylor (Dallas).
• Last four in: LSU, Purdue, Creighton, Arkansas-Little Rock.
• First four out: Texas, South Carolina, Missouri State, Wisconsin.
• Opening on their home floors: all the top seeds, plus (2) Duke, (3) Xavier, (3) Maryland, (7) Ohio State, (7) Penn State and (13) Gonzaga.
• Opening close enough to home: (11) Louisiana Tech in Shreveport, (13) BYU in Salt Lake City.
• First-round sites not getting local teams: Albuquerque, Auburn, Charlottesville and Wichita. New Mexicans love their hoops, especially in Albuquerque; and they'll probably have plenty of (2) Texas A&M Aggie fans helping fill The Pit. But I'm worried about the other three sites.
• High seeds potentially facing outright road games: (2) UCLA at Ohio State; (2) Notre Dame at Penn State; (4) Oklahoma at Gonzaga. 

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Bricketology™ 2011: Abu Scooter's first men's cut

Forget the opening of pro baseball's training camps.  The real sign of spring is the annual proliferation of Internet posts from the U.S., all claiming to predict who will make the NCAA Division I basketball tournaments.

Like this one and the next.  Last year, I correctly named the entire 65-team men's field, but now that field has 68 teams.   I'm further upping the ante this year by taking on the women's 64-team bracket. My predictions rely heavily on RPI rankings, as posted (for free) over on realtimeRPI.com.  The men's bracket (posted here) is based on the numbers that site posted Monday; the women's (next time), from its Tuesday numbers.

El soporte masculino

The big news this year has been the dominance of the Big East.  Most bracketologists think ten teams will reach the field of 68, but I'm in the sizable minority that sees 11 squads through.¹ That masks a more interesting trend, namely, a generalized shift of power eastward.  Big East success is coming largely at the expense of the ACC and the SEC.  Among the "mid-majors," the mojo has moved from the Missouri Valley (in the lower Midwest) to the Atlantic 10 and Colonial (two Eastern Seaboard leagues).  Between the mid-majors and the BCS groups, San Diego State and Brigham Young have spearheaded the rise of the Mountain West².  The Pacific 10 and West Coast conferences have suffered as a result.

Purdue is an Indiana state school, but it might host the most popular team in Virginia.  As the Boilermakers surge to maybe a #2 seed, they boost the prospects of several bubble teams based in the Old Dominion, including Virginia Tech, Virginia Commonwealth, Richmond, George Mason and, yes, Old Dominion.

This could be another year when the SEC manages to force a team into the field that doesn't belong.  Back in 2006, mid-major Missouri State missed the field despite earning an RPI of 20.  Why?  Because even though the entire SEC West sucked that year, the SEC tricked the Selection Committee into including Arkansas.  The Razorbacks confirmed The Worst Selection Ever by losing their first-round game by 30 points.  It could happen again this year, because a horrible Alabama team³ is the only SEC West side that's even close to the bubble.  Watch your back, Utah State (RPI 19)!  You, too, George Mason (RPI 20).

Okay, enough generalities.  Here are the highlights from my current projected men's bracket.

• Top seeds: Ohio State (Southeast), Kansas (West), Duke (East), Texas (Southwest).
• Play-ins (at Dayton): Montana-Texas Southern, Hampton-McNeese State, Florida State-Penn State, Colorado State-Marquette.
• Last four in: Colorado State, Penn State, Marquette, Butler.
• First four out: Valparaiso, WIchita State, Gonzaga, Virginia Tech.
• Cute first-round matches: (2) San Diego State vs. Long Beach State at Tucson; (3) North Carolina vs. Coastal Carolina at Charlotte.
• Neat second-round possibilities: (1) Ohio State vs (8) Cincinnati at Cleveland; (4) Kentucky vs. (5) Louisville at Denver; (3) Purdue vs. (6) Xavier at Chicago.

Next time: My first-ever bracketology attempt for the ladies' teams.

1 It's likely that the entire conference will see postseason action of some sort. That would be a first.
2 SDSU and BYU meet tonight Saturday, for what may be the top seed in the West Region.
3 Alabama is cheap-monster-movie awful, but that rumor that SyFy is carrying Crimson Tide home games live is completely false.

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Nailed it!

Well, that went well.

Usually, my final NCAA men's bracket projection misses 5-7 teams.  If I miss only two or three teams, that's a good year.  This year, I correctly predicted the entire field.  All 34 of my projected at-large teams made it through.  Most of them got the wrong seed -- I got the correct one for 24 of the 65 teams -- but they all made it.

I'm purring so hard, it's confusing Scooter.

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A little bracketology

Which 65 teams will make the field for the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament?  Here I venture some guesses, with less than 23 hours until the actual field is selected.

First, some rules.  The Selection Committee uses the first three, then applies additional criteria known only to itself.  The other constraint is mine, but it isn't affecting anything this year.  (It has in past seasons, though.)

1. Of the 65 bids, 30 are awarded to the winners of the postseason conference tournaments, and one goes to the Ivy League regular-season champion.  The other 34 bids are awarded on an at-large basis.  (Bracketology is, in fact, about picking these 34 teams.)
2. Conference rivals cannot meet until the regional finals (i.e., quarterfinals), unless more than eight members make the field.   This exception occurred once, in the 2000 Women's Championship.  It's never happened on the men's side.
3. Until the Final Four, no men's team may play on its home floor, or on a site where it is hosting.
4. When possible, a team from a smaller conference should always open against one from a larger conference.

As of post time (1700 CST), there are still quite a few games to play, but my bubble is down to seven teams -- Washington, UTEP, Minnesota, Illinois (all in), Seton Hall, Wichita State and Virginia Tech (all out).

Here are the projected multi-bid conferences, with projected seeds.  If New Mexico State upsets Utah State tonight, the Western Athletic would join this list.  20 other conferences are sending only their automatic qualifiers, so I'm not listing them.

Update (0000, 14.03.10):  New Mexico State has won, stealing a bid and turning tomorrow's SEC final into a proxy play-in game.  If Mississippi State wins, it advances as a 12 seed, replacing Florida.  If Kentucky wins, Florida stays in the bracket and MSU bows out.  UTEP and Minnesota are now safe, while Seton Hall, Wichita State and Virginia Tech join Illinois as top seeds in the NIT.  Corrections appear in red.

Big East [8]:  (1)West Virginia, (1)Syracuse, (2)Georgetown, (3)Villanova, (5)Pittsburgh, (7)Marquette, (9)Lousiville, (10)Notre Dame
Big XII [7]:  (1)Kansas, (2)Kansas State, (3)Baylor, (4)Texas A&M, (8)Oklahoma State, (9)Texas, (11)Missouri
ACC [6]:  (2)Duke, (4)Maryland, (9)Wake Forest, (10)Clemson, (10)Florida State, (12)Georgia Tech
Big Ten [6 5]:  (2)Ohio State, (3)Purdue, (6)Wisconsin, (6)Michigan State, (12)Minnesota, (12)Illinois
SEC[4]:  (1)Kentucky, (4)Vanderbilt, (5)Tennessee, (12)(Florida OR Mississippi State)
Mountain West [4]:  (3)New Mexico, (6)Brigham Young, (8)Nevada-Las Vegas, (8 7)San Diego State
Atlantic 10[3]: (4)Temple, (5)Xavier, (10)Richmond
Pacific 10[2]:  (6)California, (12)Washington
West Coast[2]:  (7)Gonzaga, (9)St. Mary's (Cal.)
WAC[2]:  (8)Utah State, (13)New Mexico State
Conference USA[2]:  (13)Texas-El Paso, (15)Houston

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