5 BOROUGH SPORTS

This week we have the opportunity to take a look at the brackets before we move into the weekend. The bubble is just as wild as it was a few days ago. At the top of the bracket I moved Pittsburgh up to the first line for now, but I do believe come tournament time that Duke can easily gain it back from Pittsburgh. It will be very difficult for Pitt to continue winning and anything short of a Big East title will probably send them to the 2 line, assuming a team like Duke wins the ACC.

In terms of the bubble I moved Penn State out and Clemson in. The Nittany Lions are falling and if they can’t win on the road, they certainly can’t afford to lose at home. It looks like they will once again fall short. Tuesday Clemson defeated Boston College, a 10 seed, and now moves to 17-7 (6-4 in the ACC). They don’t have a whole lot of big wins, but a variety of decent ones. At this point their resume is better than those just outside, and they have a big chance when they host UNC tomorrow. Baylor remains in, but looking at their resume its very hard to keep them in with the lack of quality wins. They are in only because they are 6-4 in the Big 12, and they must continue to play at that level to make it. The cluster of UAB, UTEP and Memphis is very tough to judge. They didn’t exactly have a great showing out of conference, yet still have combined to put together some good RPI numbers. Colorado State is a team that I’d group with them, kind of strange, unproven and maybe overrated with the numbers.

One thing I’d like to point out is some of the resources I use to put this together each week. First of all, I use the RPI numbers which the NCAA uses when putting together the bracket. I also use the site kenpom.com, a truly great collaboration of stats and rankings by Ken Pomeroy. Between the rankings of the RPI and kenpom its a good starting measure. I also like to look at other brackets and what people are thinking, for that I use the Bracket Matrix, a site that collaborates all the brackets and averages them. I have recently started adding my bracket to the site, so you can check it out there against all the others.

Here are links to some of those sites I mentioned:

Real Time RPI

kenpom.com

Bracket Matrix

Anyway that’s all for now, I’ll be back with a new Bracket on Monday.

1 Seeds-

Ohio State

Kansas

Pittsburgh

Texas

2 Seeds-

Duke

BYU

San Diego State

Notre Dame

3 Seeds-

Georgetown

Wisconsin

Purdue

Villanova

4 Seeds-

UConn

Florida

Kentucky

UNC

5 Seeds-

Syracuse

Louisville

Arizona

Texas A&M

6 Seeds-

West Virginia

Vanderbilt

Illinois

Missouri

7 Seeds-

Temple

Xavier

Cincinnati

UNLV

8 Seeds-

Tennessee

St. John’s

Minnesota

Florida State

9 Seeds-

Washington

St. Mary’s

UCLA

George Mason

10 Seeds-

Kansas State

Virginia Tech

Boston College

Michigan State

11 Seeds-

Utah State

Georgia

Oklahoma State

Old Dominion

12 Seeds-

Missouri State

UTEP

Clemson

UAB

Baylor

Richmond

13 Seeds-

Coastal Carolina

Harvard

Belmont

Butler

14 Seeds-

Oakland

Charleston

Bucknell

Vermont

15 Seeds-

Fairfield

Long Beach State

Murray State

Florida Atlantic

16 Seeds-

Jackson State

Hampton

Stephen F Austin

Buffalo

Long Island

Northern Colorado

Last Four In

Clemson

Baylor

Richmond

UAB

Last Four Out

Memphis

Colorado State

Maryland

Wichita State

Next Four Out

New Mexico

Washington State

VCU

Alabama

Also Considered

Penn State

Cleveland State

Duquesne

Nebraska

Southern Mississippi

Michigan

Butler

Gonzaga

Miami FL

Bids by Conference-

Big East-11

Big 12- 7

ACC-6

Big Ten-6

SEC-5

MWC-3

Pac Ten-3

A10-3

CUSA-2

CAA-2

This entry was posted on February 11, 2011 at 11:27 pm and is filed under Bracketology, College Basketball, St. John's. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.