Women’s Basketball Bracketology – Updated 2-26-16
Another week an a half, and much more has been settled on the women’s basketball bubble.
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Moves from local teams:
WVU got a decent boost after going 2-1 in Big 12 play. They’re a virtual lock.
Duquesne went to a virtual lock. The loss at SLU won’t hurt much, and the win at Dayton is a big win. It shouldn’t have changed things much going 1-1 against RPI 51-100 and maybe even should have hurt a little, but nobody else really took advantage of opportunities. It also shows that some of the other sites probably had the Dukes too low and my #7 rating was probably more accurate than their #9 seed lines.
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My main disagreements with the other two online brackets from Creme at ESPN and College Sports Madness (CSM) are as follows…
I have a few teams lower: Florida St (Sorry, but not enough quality wins to get a top 4 seed line), Michigan State, South Florida, and Miami. To me, none of these teams has enough good wins to boost them as high as ESPN has them. I also don’t have St. Mary’s near my field, but rather on the second four out (CSM has them dancing).
On the other end, I have Oklahoma much higher than Creme, as I think the committee will reward the Baylor win and overall RPI top 50 wins more than he’s giving it credit for. I also have Villanova much higher than Creme (9 vs 11, and CSM doesn’t even have them in the Dance). Nova has too many top 50 wins to not be in the field IMO. I have USC in the field as a #9 seed (Creme has a #10, CSM not in the field). Nebraska makes my bubble but isn’t anywhere near Creme’s list.
I completely disagree with the recent write-up by CSM that Georgia and Florida have work to do also. They’re top 20 teams overall!
Here’s my bracket…
Seeds (RPI). If no RPI is listed, that team is presumed to be a conference champion that would not make the tourney as an at-large right now. All the #11 seeds would be squarely on the bubble with a loss.
1: UConn (4), Notre Dame (1), South Carolina (2), Baylor (3)
2: Texas (6), Arizona St (8), Oregon St (7), Ohio St (5)
3: UCLA (9), Louisville (14), Kentucky (15), Texas A&M (13)
4: Stanford (10), Maryland (11), Georgia (18), DePaul (20)
5: Syracuse (17), Florida (19), Oklahoma St (21), Oklahoma (33)
6: Mississippi St (26), West Virginia (32), Seton Hall (30), BYU (12)
7: Florida St (16), Washington (28), Missouri (29), Tennessee (31, but falling fast. They’re not a lock…)
8: Duquesne (22), Michigan St (25), Miami (35) || The teams virtually assured of a bid break here, Tennessee excluded who can still fall out || Saint John’s (45)
9: South Florida (34), Villanova (49), Indiana (38), USC (42)
10: NC State (48), Purdue (57), Kansas State (46), George Washington (41)
11: Green Bay, UTEP, Penn, Colorado St
12: Penn, James Madison, Ohio, Arkansas St
13: Florida Gulf Coast, Albany, South Dakota St, Cal-Riverside
14: South Dakota, Army, UT-Martin, Northern Iowa
15: New Mexico St, Iona, UNC-Asheville, Montana St
16: Central Arkansas, Sacred Heart, Texas Southern, Morgan State
Last four in: GW, Kansas State, Purdue, NC State
First four out: Temple (60), Oregon (61), Auburn (62), Minnesota (73)
Next five out: Nebraska (90), St. Bonaventure (44), Duke (51), St Mary’s (55), Santa Clara (66)
