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Nick Federline's report on the March Madness bubble teams. He analyzes activity from teams over the past week and looks ahead at what some bubble teams will need to accomplish to secure their bid.
March Madness is right around the corner, and bracketologists around the nation are scrambling to perfect their predictions and project what field of teams the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee will choose on Sunday, March 15, 2020.
The criteria for selecting a field is arbitrary, but the Selection Committee does make use of various rankings and metrics. One of the most prominent metrics that is used is the NCAA's NET ranking. The NET ranking uses the strength of schedule, scoring margins, offensive, and defensive efficiencies, and locations of the games to rank the 353 Division I teams. Determining what quadrant a game falls into depends on the team's opponent's NET ranking.
- Quadrant 1: Home game opponent ranking 1-30, Neutral site 1-50, Away game 1-75
- Quadrant 2: Home game 31-75, Neutral site 51-100, Away game 76-135
- Quadrant 3: Home game 76-160, Neutral site 101-200, Away game 135-240
- Quadrant 4: Home game 161-353, Neutral site 201-353, Away game 241-353
Below, we will take a look at the movement on the bubble and see what teams need to accomplish in order to further secure their bids to the Big Dance.
Brigham Young University (BYU)
The BYU Cougars can punch their ticket to the Big Dance. BYU notched an impressive 91-78 win over Gonzaga, ensuring that the West Coast Conference will once again have multiple bids this year. The Cougars will be a difficult matchup in the Tournament due to the well-oiled offensive machine that Coach Mark Pope is operating. BYU has gone 15-2 with star forward Yoeli Childs in the lineup. The six-foot-eight Childs is a matchup nightmare with a toolset of post moves and a 50% mark from beyond the arc resulting in 21 points per game. BYU being a Mormon school does pose a unique dilemma for the Selection Committee as they will be required by school policy to not play games on Sundays, which could cause them to fall to a lower than expected seed in order to set them up to play on a Thursday for both their first-round game and any potential Sweet 16 game
Status: Safely in the field (projected #7 seed)
Richmond
The Atlantic 10 Conference is in the midst of a banner season. Dayton has run the table outside of nonconference overtime losses to Colorado and Kansas, and the team has arguably six teams vying for NCAA Tournament or NIT bids. The Spiders are presently listed as one of Joe Lunardi's Last Four Teams In but dropped a crucial game on Saturday at Saint Bonaventure. The Richmond Spiders' four remaining conference matchups give them four winnable games, but any slip-up would likely move them to the wrong side of the bubble. If the Spiders can hold off George Washington and UMass this week, they will not have helped their position and we will still be talking about them next week, but if they lose either of those games they will be in an even more perilous position than before.
Status: Stock unchanged, but can't afford to lose (projected #12 seed)
Virginia
The defending champions are looking more and more like a team that team will be eager to steer clear of in the bracket. The Cavaliers have won seven of their past eight, many defensive slugfests, and an impressive win over Florida State to hang their hat on. With two of their final four games being played against Quad-1 opponents (Duke and Louisville), the Hoos are unlikely to be punished for those losses but will need to take care of business against Miami or Notre Dame. If the Cavaliers can avoid an 0-4 finish to the season, they should feel comfortable on Selection Sunday.
Status: Stock up (Projected #10 seed)
East Tennessee State
Coach Steve Forbes' Buccaneers have run the Southern Conference gauntlet once again with minimal damage. Despite not having the services of senior forward Jeromy Rodriguez for half of the season and a host of other injuries, ETSU finds itself with a rare opportunity of providing the Southern Conference with multiple bids to the Tournament. The Quad-4 loss to Mercer is a damning stain on an otherwise immaculate resume. One of the big keys on Selection Sunday will be determining how much the Selection Committee will value the Bucs' December win at LSU, as well as how much the Committee will weight the bad loss to Mercer. If the Buccaneers are unable to win their conference tournament to ensure the automatic bid, the watch party in Johnson City, Tennessee will certainly be one to keep an eye on.
Status: Stock unchanged, but can't afford to lose (Projected #11 seed)
Purdue
According to most national pundits, the Big Ten is having an unprecedentedly strong year. There are only two of the fourteen teams without reasonable NCAA Tournament aspirations. Thanks to the strong conference, Purdue has been afforded more than its share of Quad-1 opportunities, but they are only 4-11 in Quad-1 games. With a 14-14 record and a sub-.500 record in conference play, the case for a Purdue at-large bid is suspect at first glance. However, the team has three remaining Quad-1 and Quad-2 opportunities ahead and plenty of time to bolster its resume. Coach Matt Painter's team has relied on its strong defense, which ranks 28th in the nation in points allowed per game, but the offense has been non-existent in their current four-game losing streak. If Junior Dutch center Matt Haarms can neutralize Iowa star center, Luka Garza, on March 3, the Boilermakers' will have an opportunity to pick up one of their biggest wins of the season to help a shaky resume.
Status: Stock down (Projected - First Four Out)
Providence
No team helped their case for a Tournament bid in the past week more than the Providence Friars. Coach Ed Cooley's team was left for dead by bracketologists as soon as late January with an 11-10 record and a Quad-4 home loss against Long Beach State. Since then, the team has gone 5-2, with four of those wins over ranked teams. On Saturday, February 29, the Friars travel to Philadelphia for the biggest remaining game on their schedule against Villanova. If Providence can pull off the upset road upset, they should move into the field in our update next week.
Status: Stock up (Projected - First Four Out)
Stay tuned for our weekly update on the bubble each week before Selection Sunday.
