Bracketology through games of March 1, 2021
Good, Bad, & Meh from March 1, 2021
Good:
- Oklahoma State notching its 8th Q1 win (tied for most overall) by sweeping Oklahoma in the Bedlam Series;
- Syracuse keeping alive hope that it will once again be in the First Four with a home victory over the hot and cold North Carolina Tar Heels, although the Orange has resume metrics that should be prima facie disqualifying.
Bad:
- Rutgers suffering a terrible 21-point Q3 loss at Pinnacle Bank Arena to Nebraska;
- St. Bonaventure taking a Q3 home loss to Dayton as the A10 continues to cause its tournament hopefuls mass chaos;
- Staying in the A10, Richmond all-but-officially ending its hopes for an at-large bid with its second Q4 loss, this time at home to St. Joe’s;
- Oklahoma’s slide continues with its 3rd loss in a row and a back-to-back sweep at the hands of Bedlam rival Oklahoma St.
Meh:
- Saint Louis followed up a good win over Richmond by holding serve against UMass, proving the exception to the A10 chaos rule. Billikens still need a few wins in the A10 tournament for its at-large case.
- Colorado St. looking the part of a team that wants to dance with a convincing win over Air Force
- North Carolina plays Jekyll and Hyde again losing on the road to Syracuse in a game that would have firmly entrenched them in the field. The Heels are pretty safe after the Florida St win, but they need to do a little more work to be sure. The big matchup with Duke on Saturday looms.
- Virginia stifled Miami and prevented another bad loss.
Bracket Movers and Shakers:
I tweeted during the game that I had Oklahoma State massively under-seeded. I’ve remedied that somewhat, moving the Cowboys from the 8-line to the 6-line, just in front of its swept Bedlam rivals.
By virtue of the moves, Wisconsin falls to the 7-line and San Diego St. to the 8-line.
Rutgers and St. Bonaventure move to the 10-line with their losses. Louisville and Oregon move up to the 9-line.
Tuesday’s At-Large Bracket Games to Watch:
A nice slate of Tuesday games includes some Bubble matchups and two big-time battles between teams in the top 3 seed lines.
Baylor at West Virginia
Wisconsin at Purdue
Illinois at Michigan
Duke at Georgia Tech
Indiana at Michigan St.
Kentucky at Ole Miss (barely a bracket game, but should be fun)
Xavier at Georgetown
Arkansas at South Carolina
Auburn at Alabama
Vanderbilt at LSU
Memphis at South Florida
Texas at Iowa St.
TCU at Texas Tech
Fresno St at Boise St
Dubz on Hoops 