2016 Bracketology (FINALIZED) 11/27

[lawnmowerfan]

Big Ten is locked with 8 teams, no question. Unless Iowa shocks all of us and upsets someone other than Rutgers, I don't see how they get in the tournament - even with 9 conference wins.

So that leaves Illinois and Indiana as bubble teams. Both teams have Rutgers still, so the RPI for both teams will naturally drop. But both still have some big opportunities remaining.

Illinois still has Maryland, Ohio State, @ Rutgers, @ Penn State
Indiana still has @ Rutgers, @ Maryland, @ Ohio State

Is there a scenario where they take 10 B1G teams? What does Illinois have to do? What does Indiana have to do? Would they really take four Missouri Valley teams or three Mountain West teams over an additional B1G team? Hopefully someone understands this selection stuff more than I do . I love this time of year!!

[huskersrule95]

Nov 17, 2016 21:46:17 GMT -5 lawnmowerfan said:

Big Ten is locked with 8 teams, no question. Unless Iowa shocks all of us and upsets someone other than Rutgers, I don't see how they get in the tournament - even with 9 conference wins.

So that leaves Illinois and Indiana as bubble teams. Both teams have Rutgers still, so the RPI for both teams will naturally drop. But both still have some big opportunities remaining.

Illinois still has Maryland, Ohio State, @ Rutgers, @ Penn State
Indiana still has @ Rutgers, @ Maryland, @ Ohio State

Is there a scenario where they take 10 B1G teams? What does Illinois have to do? What does Indiana have to do? Would they really take four Missouri Valley teams or three Mountain West teams over an additional B1G team? Hopefully someone understands this selection stuff more than I do . I love this time of year!!

I can't really see either making it. Indiana is only 5-12 in the B1G and 16-14 overall and only 2 good wins (vs Michigan and vs Ohio State). They have 0 good OOC or wins on road. 

Illinois is 7-9 in B1G with 2 good wins @purdue and vs Michigan St and on 7 game losing streak right now.  They need to win out to have chance and can't see winning both vs Ohio State and especially @ Penn State 

[lawnmowerfan]

Illinois gets a huge win over Ohio State at home tonight. Seeing how the Illini will go at least 1-1 next weekend (@rutgers, @penn State) does tonight's win push them over the hump for an at-large bid?

[trojansc]

Nov 19, 2016 22:28:39 GMT -5 lawnmowerfan said:

Illinois gets a huge win over Ohio State at home tonight. Seeing how the Illini will go at least 1-1 next weekend (@rutgers, @penn State) does tonight's win push them over the hump for an at-large bid?

I think Illinois is in now, but just barely. Two wins next week guarantee a bid from me.

[lawnmowerfan]

Nov 19, 2016 22:32:22 GMT -5 trojansc said:

Nov 19, 2016 22:28:39 GMT -5 lawnmowerfan said:

Illinois gets a huge win over Ohio State at home tonight. Seeing how the Illini will go at least 1-1 next weekend (@rutgers, @penn State) does tonight's win push them over the hump for an at-large bid?

I think Illinois is in now, but just barely. Two wins next week guarantee a bid from me.

Happy for Kevin and that program. Grittted all season long.

You are the expert here...does Indiana stand any shot of getting in (even if they go 3-0, which will be no easy feat)? In your opinion, would the committee actually take 10 teams from one league?

[trojansc]

Nov 19, 2016 22:35:46 GMT -5 lawnmowerfan said:

Nov 19, 2016 22:32:22 GMT -5 trojansc said:

I think Illinois is in now, but just barely. Two wins next week guarantee a bid from me.

Happy for Kevin and that program. Grittted all season long.

You are the expert here...does Indiana stand any shot of getting in (even if they go 3-0, which will be no easy feat)? In your opinion, would the committee actually take 10 teams from one league?

Yes the committee will take 10 bids if they deserve it. The PAC got 10 bids in 2014, and I believe they deserved it.

Indiana absolutely has to win out to deserve a bid. Then, they need a couple other bubble teams to probably falter. If IU wins out, they should be among the last 4 in or the first four out.

Illinois has the H2H win over Indiana, so that hurts them if they are competing for the last bid. IU wants to win out, and have Illinois lose to Penn State.

Iowa is in the biggest trouble of anyone

[n00b]

So now what does the committee do with Miami?

[trollhunter]

Nov 20, 2016 20:15:30 GMT -5 n00b said:

So now what does the committee do with Miami?

Compare them with other teams on the bubble.

They have a top 25 win, and a top 50 win. They may have another top 50 win depending on where NIU finishes in RPI. It will be close.

[trojansc]

Updated the decisions for seedings and at-larges, and released my predicted bracket. I will post RPI numbers and reasoning for my decisions after the RPI & nitty-gritty is releaed later today.

There is a lot of potential movement in RPI from the #5-12 spots. It's scary how close the margins are.

Remember that in my predicted conference bracket MANY of the teams that have to travel could be sent so many places. There are so many different scenarios. UCLA, Stanford, and Washington are too hard to predict because they are flying in a lot of teams.

I have UNLV as the first team out and Miami(OH) as the last team in right now.

[bluepenquin]

Nov 21, 2016 6:27:32 GMT -5 trojansc said:

Updated the decisions for seedings and at-larges, and released my predicted bracket. I will post RPI numbers and reasoning for my decisions after the RPI & nitty-gritty is releaed later today.

There is a lot of potential movement in RPI from the #5-12 spots. It's scary how close the margins are.

Remember that in my predicted conference bracket MANY of the teams that have to travel could be sent so many places. There are so many different scenarios. UCLA, Stanford, and Washington are too hard to predict because they are flying in a lot of teams.

I have UNLV as the first team out and Miami(OH) as the last team in right now.

A couple tweaks related to reducing the number of fly-ins:

North Carolina would need to have James Madison and High Point.  This would move American and Howard to Kansas and Nebraska.

Illinois or Purdue (probably Illinois) would need to go to Missouri as they have enough drive-in options not to have any fly-ins.

East Tennessee was eliminated - if Samford wins today they can replace ETSU in the Kentucky regional, but if Chattanooga wins there would be another option.

Also/or one of those Big Ten teams could go to Kentucky and beef up that sub regional.

Interesting prospect of Kansas or UCLA (and Florida) may not have a viable regional hosting option - certainly not their preferred option.

[dawgs4life]

Penn State in Seattle?! No thanks!

[c4ndlelight]

Michigan needs a win this week or they are not hosting.

[big10+4 fan]

How different would your bracketology look if the committee followed their process from last year where they made sure no seeded teams from the same conference met each other until at earliest the elite eight? Right now the only teams affected by this are Nebraska (Michigan) and Minnesota (Michigan State.

[bayarea]

With your projections today, BYU would be looking at a potential second round matchup against Utah, the only team in recent memory to have beaten them on their home court (earlier this season).

[trojansc]

Nov 21, 2016 14:07:20 GMT -5 bayarea said:

With your projections today, BYU would be looking at a potential second round matchup against Utah, the only team in recent memory to have beaten them on their home court (earlier this season).

To be honest, i think Utah is a better candidate for a seed than Michigan. But I don't think the committee is going to have two hosts in Utah