(01-21-2022 09:17 AM)bearcatmark Wrote:  The thing I would stress is those team odds don't work independently from one another. It's very likely as a couple team odds go down, another team will go up. AAC has a few teams that could make the tournament with a strong finish. I suspect one or two will emerge from the bloated middle.

Again, I am really liking that Haslametrics site.

And I totally agree— namely there is absolutely no way CUSA will get three teams in. If one or two elevate inside the at-large zone, it will be at the expense of the other bubble team(s).

AAC on the other hand, does have a plausible scenario to a three-bid league.

It’s an “up” year in CUSA and two of the top three there are on their way to AAC.

I am staring to think this ends up as a 3 bid league

If UC wins the next 4 games (2 road games and 2 home games with Houston & Memphis) they will 100% be on the right side of the bubble:


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SMU, Cincinnati, and UCF need to take care of business. Do that and we could have 3-4 teams in. SMU can lose 1 more game in the regular season and it can't be to USF. Cincinnati needs to keep doing well and UCF needs to go on a run.

According to team rankings, Memphis has a 23% chance to get an at large bid at this point in time. SMU needs to get to 25 wins to have a greater than 50% chance to get in the tournament. UC needs to get to 26 wins. UCF needs to get to 23 wins. Right now, SMU has a 10% chance at an at large, UC has a 1% chance and UCF has a 2% chance. According to Bracketmatrix (as of 1/19), none of the 88 sites predict SMU in the field, 6 predict UCF and 1 predicts UC. Side note, 11 predicted Memphis.

Right now, I would guess the American gets 2 bids. Someone will finish strong and claim the bid. However, there are a lot of resumes that look better on paper than the AAC teams.

(01-21-2022 03:05 PM)MU88 Wrote:  SMU needs to get to 25 wins to have a greater than 50% chance to get in the tournament.

That may be what teamrankings is predicting, but in the history of the conference, every AAC team that had 24+ wins has made the tournament.

In addition, some 21, 22, + 23-win AAC teams have earned NCAA at-large bids.

2014: Memphis (24 wins)

2015: Temple (21 wins), Cincy (23 wins)

2016: Cincy (22 wins), Tulsa (20 wins)

2019: Temple (23 wins), UCF (24 wins)

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Another fact to bear in mind that the AAC has had two or more NCAA teams per year, every year since its inception.

Since the AAC is the #7th ranked conference, the selection committee may go out of their way, if needed, to make sure that the AAC receives at least two bids. Last year, for example, they awarded an at-large bid to Wichita State even though it had a NET ranking in the 70s.

The AAC's high conference rankings can make a difference. For example, the AAC was the #6th ranked conference in 2019, and it received 4 NCAA bids (more than the PAC-12 received), including the bid to the 23-win Temple team.

For these reasons, if SMU is the #2 team in the AAC this year, they could have as high as a 75%+ chance of receiving a NCAA bid, if they can win 24 games.

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UCF will have a great chance to get back in picture if it beatsHouston at home. This will be their best shot going forward.

(01-22-2022 08:13 PM)Cubanbull1 Wrote:  UCF will have a great chance to get back in picture if it beatsHouston at home. This will be their best shot going forward.

Agreed, as long as we don’t lay any more eggs we should be in a good spot moving forward

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For those interested in the future AAC teams, UAB is now 16-4 and looking more and more like a probable NCAA team.

Their NET rank has moved up to #37.

They're 3-3 (2-1, 1-2) in Q1/Q2 games and a solid 11-1 in Q3/Q4 games.

kenpom.com has them ranked #40.

That looks like a potential NCAA tournament resume.

60 of 93 bracketologies have them in, most likely as a 12-seed.

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N. Texas (13-4) looks like a probable NIT team at this point.

NET rank: #54

kenpom.com: #67

massey composite: #60

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(01-23-2022 12:49 PM)Milwaukee Wrote:  .

For those interested in the future AAC teams, UAB is now 16-4 and looking more and more like a probable NCAA team.

Their NET rank has moved up to #37.

They're 3-3 (2-1, 1-2) in Q1/Q2 games and a solid 11-1 in Q3/Q4 games.

kenpom.com has them ranked #40.

That looks like a NCAA tournament resume.

60 of 93 bracketologies have them in, most likely as a 12-seed.

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N. Texas (13-4) looks like a probable NIT team at this point.

NET rank: #54

kenpom.com: #67

massey composite: #60

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Wouldn’t say we’re an NCAA team yet. We probably need to win out and make the conference tourney final to feel even remotely comfortable. Unless the numbers really start going our way i.e., La Tech getting into the top 75 and giving us a third Q1 win. Honestly just glad to be in the conversation though, after a decade where our seasons were done in December and hoping we’d win the conference tourney to get in. Andy Kennedy is slowly getting us back to where we need to be.

(01-23-2022 01:10 PM)Blazer4Life14 Wrote:  

(01-23-2022 12:49 PM)Milwaukee Wrote:  .

For those interested in the future AAC teams, UAB is now 16-4 and looking more and more like a probable NCAA team.

Their NET rank has moved up to #37.

They're 3-3 (2-1, 1-2) in Q1/Q2 games and a solid 11-1 in Q3/Q4 games.

kenpom.com has them ranked #40.

That looks like a NCAA tournament resume.

60 of 93 bracketologies have them in, most likely as a 12-seed.

.

N. Texas (13-4) looks like a probable NIT team at this point.

NET rank: #54

kenpom.com: #67

massey composite: #60

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Wouldn’t say we’re an NCAA team yet. We probably need to win out and make the conference tourney final to feel even remotely comfortable. Unless the numbers really start going our way i.e., La Tech getting into the top 75 and giving us a third Q1 win. Honestly just glad to be in the conversation though, after a decade where our seasons were done in December and hoping we’d win the conference tourney to get in. Andy Kennedy is slowly getting us back to where we need to be.

massey has UAB favored to win their last 11 conference games.

https://masseyratings.com/cb2022/87

If they can win 10 of those games, they'll head into their conf. tourney with 26 wins. Winning two tournament games would make them something like 28-6.

At 2-1 in Q1 games, UAB is in good shape, but it would be helpful to even out the Q2 record at 2-2 and end up ~ 5-5 in Q1/Q2 games, and not losing any Q3 or Q4 games.

That could put UAB at something like: Q1: ~3-2, Q2: ~3-3; Q3: 10-1; Q4: 12-0

With a record like that, and a NET ranking of 37, it would be hard to deny UAB an at-large bid.

kenpom.com's #40 ranking would make them a probable "first-four" 11-seed.

At worst, UAB's combined rankings would seem to make them a likely 1 seed in the NIT if they fall just short with "just" 26 or 27 wins.

Yet a NIT run could be a very good thing for a program in a later stage of a multi-year rebuilding phase, since it would give them some very valuable tournament experience, and probably a lot more experience than they might get if they were to go 1 and done in the NCAA.

Memphis showed, last year, that it can be a great thing to get a high seed in the NIT. Their NIT championship probably generated more positive publicity for that program than a loss in the Sweet 16 would have done. From that standpoint, as much as I'd like to see UAB play in the NCAA tourney, I'd far prefer to see them advance to the NIT quarter- or semi-finals than to see them lose a "first-four" game. It seems important for somebody to mention that.

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Cincinnati, SMU, and UCF are back on the bubble according to Joe Lunardi. If these teams keep on winning we could have 4 or even 5 teams in the tournament as unrealistic as it may seem.

(01-25-2022 12:37 PM)mustangxc Wrote:  Cincinnati, SMU, and UCF are back on the bubble according to Joe Lunardi. If these teams keep on winning we could have 4 or even 5 teams in the tournament as unrealistic as it may seem.

Na. For the same reason we probably don't end up with only 1 team... someone from that group is likely to get the end needed to get an at large but it's going to come at the expense of one or two of the others.

SMU and Cincinnati already played each other once and only have one game left against each other. SMU and UCF already played each other once and do not face each other again. That has to help our chances. SMU simply needs to beat Cincinnati at home and split with Houston and take care of business with everyone else. I think that is fairly realistic. Cincinnati has to play 2 against Houston, 1 against SMU and 1 against UCF. UCF has 2 against Houston and 1 against UCF. If we all split against Houston, and take care of all other opponents I don't think the games against each other would keep us out of the tournament.

The problem with UCF and SMU is they really don't have many, if any, really good wins, but both have bad losses. They are going to have to beat someone to get in, but the only really highly ranked team they play is Houston. UC has a win against Illinois, but also has a couple bad losses. In contrast, a school like Minnesota is 2-5 against quad 1 schools and undefeated against everyone else. Texas A&M hasn't lost to anyone outside quad 1 either. A&M is 61 in NET and Minnesota is 78. So, not only do the AAC schools have to win, their competition for bids has to have a bad loss or two. Unfortunately, the conference has not done well against the better teams in the country, it is a combined 2-11 against AP top 25 schools. Plus, it did not give itself a chance for those kind of wins with their non-conference schedule.

(01-25-2022 01:45 PM)MU88 Wrote:  The problem with UCF and SMU is they really don't have many, if any, really good wins, but both have bad losses. They are going to have to beat someone to get in, but the only really highly ranked team they play is Houston. UC has a win against Illinois, but also has a couple bad losses. In contrast, a school like Minnesota is 2-5 against quad 1 schools and undefeated against everyone else. Texas A&M hasn't lost to anyone outside quad 1 either. A&M is 61 in NET and Minnesota is 78. So, not only do the AAC schools have to win, their competition for bids has to have a bad loss or two. Unfortunately, the conference has not done well against the better teams in the country, it is a combined 2-11 against AP top 25 schools. Plus, it did not give itself a chance for those kind of wins with their non-conference schedule.

UCF won @Miami (likely tourney team), Michigan (bubble team). However the usf loss really stings, they’re a NET landmine that we jumped headfirst onto. However I think if we beat Houston once and win the majority of the rest of our games, we are in a good spot.

I don’t see us getting in personally. The USF loss hurts way to much. We would need to split with Houston and win every game remaining on our schedule. There is nothing that I have seen this season that would make me believe that. We are an incredibly inconsistent team and there’s no way we won’t drop 1-2 more conference games along with Houston. Maybe next year with Hendricks we could make some noise but this year we’re a NIT team in my opinion

(01-25-2022 08:51 PM)Casanova Wrote:  I don’t see us getting in personally. The USF loss hurts way to much. We would need to split with Houston and win every game remaining on our schedule. There is nothing that I have seen this season that would make me believe that. We are an incredibly inconsistent team and there’s no way we won’t drop 1-2 more conference games along with Houston. Maybe next year with Hendricks we could make some noise but this year we’re a NIT team in my opinion

We don’t need to win every other game, just most of them, which is very possible. Whether the team will actually do that is up in the air.

(01-21-2022 11:36 AM)UCBearcatlawjd2 Wrote:  I am staring to think this ends up as a 3 bid league

How?

(01-25-2022 06:31 PM)BraveKnight Wrote:  

(01-25-2022 01:45 PM)MU88 Wrote:  The problem with UCF and SMU is they really don't have many, if any, really good wins, but both have bad losses. They are going to have to beat someone to get in, but the only really highly ranked team they play is Houston. UC has a win against Illinois, but also has a couple bad losses. In contrast, a school like Minnesota is 2-5 against quad 1 schools and undefeated against everyone else. Texas A&M hasn't lost to anyone outside quad 1 either. A&M is 61 in NET and Minnesota is 78. So, not only do the AAC schools have to win, their competition for bids has to have a bad loss or two. Unfortunately, the conference has not done well against the better teams in the country, it is a combined 2-11 against AP top 25 schools. Plus, it did not give itself a chance for those kind of wins with their non-conference schedule.

UCF won @Miami (likely tourney team), Michigan (bubble team). However the usf loss really stings, they’re a NET landmine that we jumped headfirst onto. However I think if we beat Houston once and win the majority of the rest of our games, we are in a good spot.

Miami has a NET of 67. On what planet is that a “likely tourney team”?

Hanging your entire hat on a Michigan home win is asking a lot, especially with a current NET of 77. Your NET is gonna have to jump about 30 spots just to be in the conversation. It’s gonna take more than just “winning a few games” to do that.

I appreciate optimism when realism is also considered. UCF will only be getting in with 3 wins in Ft. Worth, barring a 10 game winning streak.