“Perception is reality”, as the old saying goes. In college basketball, how we perceive our team (and other teams) tends to exist within a particular space, and that space is buttressed, altered, and filled by circumstantial evidence that supports our existing thought process.

Nowhere is this more true than in NCAA bracket projections, which are very fluid, not just from year to year, but within the same year as well. We get an idea of what a 3-seed or a 4-seed “looks like”, and then we compare that ideal to our own team. In most fans’ cases, their perceptions are off. Why? Because they tend to only look at the evidence that directly relates to their team, rather than looking at things holistically across the entire potential tournament field.

There’s been a lot of talk about Indiana’s seeding potential. Most people came into today saying something close to the following: “Well, if IU wins this, they’ll be a 3. If they lose, they’ll drop to a 5.” Seems logical, yes?

Well, I would argue that IU is still very much in 3-seed discussion, even with today’s loss. Let’s look at the teams involved.

Everyone agrees that there are two teams on the 1-seed line as absolute locks for that seed: Kentucky and Syracuse.

There’s also a clear consensus on the next six teams, which would comprise (in some order) the remaining two 1-seeds and all four 2-seeds: Kansas, Ohio State, North Carolina, Michigan State, Missouri, and Duke.

So with 8 teams gone, we now find ourselves in the 3 and 4 seed range, for spots 9-16 on the S-curve. Who are the teams that occupy that space right now?

I would argue that it’s the following: Michigan (by virtue of their shared conference title), Marquette (who lost in the Big East tournament), Wisconsin (who has an incredibly impressive resume), Indiana (who owns three of the best wins in college basketball), Georgetown (who also lost in the Big East tournament), Baylor (whose resume is solid but not overwhelming), Louisville, Florida State, and UNLV.

Given what has occurred so far, I would rank those teams in this order:

9. Wisconsin

10. Michigan

11. Marquette

12. Indiana (last 3 seed)

13. Georgetown

14. Baylor

15. Louisville

16. Florida State (last 4 seed)

17. UNLV

There isn’t much separating most of these teams, but that is perfectly normal; the NCAA tournament is the ultimate in creeping incrementalism. In looking at, say, Georgetown and Indiana, the comparison is very close — almost too close to call. So you then have to look at the wins. Whose wins do you like better? Do you prefer Marquette, Memphis(2x), and Louisville? Or you prefer Michigan State, Ohio State, and Kentucky? I think we’ll find that the committee favors the latter.

Obviously, there are still factors that could change the situation. Louisville beating Syracuse would probably push them into the 3 line. Baylor beating Kansas would almost certainly do the same. And Florida State beating one of the top two teams in the ACC would likely accomplish the same. But those things are future occurrences, not existing ones, and it’s the existing ones that we have to use to project the bracket.

So if you’re an IU fan, don’t write off the 3 seed yet. Seeds are awarded based on accrual, and the Hoosiers have accrued quite a bit this season.

No time for description today, as I’m heading up to the Big Ten Tournament in about 10 minutes. But here is the latest bracket projection. Comments? Questions, Just leave a message below. NOTE: I made a typo on this. Please switch Texas and Davidson into each other’s spots.

I’d like to welcome our new entrants to the tournament field today. Detroit, Western Kentucky, South Dakota State, and Harvard have all found their way into the field. And so has South Florida, although that’s not because of anything they did, per se. Let’s just take a look at the bracket:

Wait, what?: Ah, some changes since last time! Yes, I shuffled the 1 seeds, mostly because I wanted to see what would happen in some alternate scenarios, but also because I’m starting to question whether the selection committee would really leave a champion (or in this case, co-champion) of the top-rated RPI conference without a 1 seed. As my bracket colleague Kyle pointed out last night, the last 10 years have seen the top-rated conference’s champion get a 1 seed in every single instance, even when the team in question has 5 or 6 losses. Ohio State’s resume is still excellent, so they move into the fourth 1-seed. Kansas ends up as the odd man out. I would prefer that North Carolina lose the slot, but I have a feeling it’s going to be the Jayhawks on the outside looking in.

No thanks, you can keep the 3 seed: The Detroit Titans made the field yesterday after pulling away from Valpo on the Crusaders’ home floor. So where do you seed them? RPI-wise, they have a 16-seed quality about them. They did play a rougher non-conference schedule than most, but underachieved throughout the regular season. But one look at this team tells you that it’s not a 16-seed type squad. They have way too much talent for that. So we’re looking at them this week as a 14 seed, and that just adds to what is an already hellacious 14 seed line. Detroit, Belmont, South Dakota State, and Akron are all very good teams, capable of pulling off a couple of wins in the NCAA tournament. The 3 and 4 seeds in this year’s field are going to have a heck of a time with this group. And the likelihood now is that the 13-16 seeds are set, since most of the smaller conferences have either already played their tournament final or will feature teams that won’t cause a huge amount of change in where the other squads are. Akron still has to win the MAC, so they could be in trouble, but the other three are set, as are three of the four teams on the 13 line.

Big East / Big Ten Challenge: The top four seed lines are what we call “protected”, meaning that teams get certain geographical and matchup advantages in the first round that aren’t provided to others. But the challenging process this year has come when trying to seed teams on those lines from the Big East and Big Ten. The process is supposed to place the top three teams from each conference in different regions. But the process is also supposed to allow a one seed to not have any conference foes in their bracket, although some very lowly-seeded teams occasionally sneak in when there are lots of teams from a particular conference. With this bracket, we have three Big East teams in the top 12, and five Big Ten teams. So in order to maintain seeding/bracketing rules, I had to jump Baylor up to the 3 seed in the East Region, causing Georgetown and Wisconsin to both operate as 4 seeds. This will make for an interesting challenge in the committee room this weekend.

Sorry, Hawks: One thing this week has provided above all else is a chance to really go through each team’s resume with a fine-tooth comb. And that process has now led to me dropping two teams out of my at-large field. The first was Texas, two days ago, and the Longhorns are still out, although they can really help themselves in the Big 12 Tournament. But today’s casualty was the Saint Joseph’s Hawks, who lost their spot to the South Florida Bulls. Both resumes are awful, but I like the road win at Louisville a bit more than the two wins at home for the Hawks, and the overall volume of victories is slightly better for South Florida.

On the last regular-season edition of CrimsonCast Live, Galen and Matt talk Big Ten Tournament, NCAA Tournament, and overall expectations for the team moving forward. We also have a lengthy discussion about the Big Ten awards and what caused them to end up the way they did. Guests on the program include Mike Pegram from Peegs.com, and Connor O’Gara of the Indiana Daily Student. We talk with both about the emergence of Verdell Jones as a “super-sub” of sorts, how the Big Ten tournament will be much different than the past few years, and what the NCAA ramifications are of that tournament for the Hoosiers.

CrimsonCast Live 03-06-12 [ 2:00:01 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (269)

As promised, here’s our next edition of the Bracket Report. We will be updating the bracket and S-curve every day this week, in order to get a better handle on the tournament field. We didn’t have a *huge* amount of changes from last time, but there were a few. Here’s the bracket:

UPON CLOSER EXAMINATION: After going through the resumes several times, I finally decided to sit Texas down, replacing them with Miami. It’s a bad batch of accomplishments in the last four in, but I ever-so-slightly favor what the Hurricanes have done. Victories against Duke and Florida State stand out in that group. Texas’s resume is a slightly worse version of Seton Hall’s, and that’s not a great recipe.

SORRY DRAGONS: I still don’t like Drexel, despite the obscene amount of love being shown for the Dragons on Twitter and SportsCenter last night. Have they had a great run the last two months? Sure they have. But it’s disingenuous of ESPN to put up Drexel’s resume “since January 4th”, as they did last night. Are we going to cherrypick the best two months of each team’s schedule? If so, then others did more against much better competition with their two months than did Drexel. If not, then we have to consider the bad losses at the start of the season, as well as the complete lack of any victories against decent teams in the out of conference section of the schedule. And with all that said…I won’t be surprised if the committee puts Drexel in. We’ve seen these situations happen in past years, and in trying to predict the committee’s approach, you have to consider Drexel (and other teams like them).

AUTO BID CARNAGE: We lost both Oral Roberts and Denver last night, and that could be a shame for both conferences. It’s almost certainly a shame for the Sun Belt, who has now lost its two best teams (the Pioneers and Middle Tennessee State) and finds itself staring down the barrel of a 16 seed, rather than the 13 or 14 seed they’d likely have received. As for the Summit League, they’ve still got a chance at decent seeding with South Dakota State. Elsewhere, the MAAC saw its seeding tumble with the loss of Iona in the semifinals, and the Gaels aren’t likely to factor into at-large discussion. Loyola does have a road win vs Bucknell, which should keep them out of the play-in game, but that’s about the extent of what the Greyhounds can hope for.

REORDERING THE SEEDS: After taking a closer look at the seeds, I’ve dropped Iowa State and Mississippi State down a couple lines, while increasing the standing of Vanderbilt and Baylor. We’ve also seen some of our previous 16 and 15 seeds rise up a bit, as witnessed by Montana and Belmont going up a full line from a week ago this time.

We find ourselves on the opening day of Championship Week, and the bracket is as fluid as I can remember it being at this point in terms of seeding. We’ve also had some upsets in the smaller conference tournaments, which has shaken things up a bit. Let’s take a look at this week:

TOP SEED SHUFFLE: I feel for Michigan State a bit. They work all season to get themselves in 1-seed contention, then they lose the outright conference title at home AND lose their third-best scorer for the rest of the season. As we’ve seen in the past (Cincinnati in 2000, as an example), the committee doesn’t look kindly at impactful injuries to top seeds. I don’t see them dropping much below the 2 line, unless they bomb out of the B1G tourney to Iowa or Illinois. But this is definitely a difficult situation for the Spartans. Meanwhile, North Carolina grabs the fourth 1 seed…but is it safe? Not really. Ohio State could reach up and claim it with a good week in Indianapolis.

ADIOS, ARIZONA: I finally work up the courage to put the Wildcats in the field, and they respond the same day by losing to a putrid Arizona State team. Thanks, guys. Really. That should take the Wildcats out of the mix, but who knows? I like California’s chances at an at-large, and I think Washington is a near-lock due to winning the regular season championship in the Pac 12. They SHOULDN’T be a near-lock, but this is what the committee has done in the past. Oregon is playing on the margins and is still very much alive for a bid.

YES, THEY ARE WEAK…BUT…: We’ve heard lots of teams referred to as being “in trouble” in the past few days, and when you look at the resumes of teams like Southern Miss, Virginia, St. Mary’s, Seton Hall, Northwestern, etc…yes, it’s obvious that these teams are pretty weak compared to bubble teams of the past. But be realistic — there are worse teams BELOW those squads. Texas, Xavier, St. Joseph’s…these are all teams that are currently in the field, and it’d be hard to justify putting any of them above the teams that started this paragraph.

The Bracketology Show is back for another week, as we enter Championship Week in college basketball. No guests this week, as the guys focus all their energies on breaking down the remaning 250+ teams vying for automatic and at-large bids. The show starts off with some talk of two small conference favorites going down prematurely in their conference tournaments, and whether either team has a chance at an at-large bid. We then switch the topic to Michigan State, Ohio State, and the Big Ten as a whole, and get really excited about the prospect of some of these B1G tournament games. Other topics discussed include our picks for the teams who stand to gain or lose the most seeding-wise in conference tournament play, the merits of Tennessee as an at-large, and our “bold predictions” for the week.

BracketPod 03-05-12 [ 2:00:03 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (151)

It’s time for a special edition of the Bracket Report. For the rest of this week, we’ll be starting off every morning with an updated view of the bracket, accounting for the wins and losses of the previous night. Here’s where we stand as of Sunday morning, March 4:

REARRANGING THE ICING: Kansas and Michigan State have landed the third and fourth 1 seeds in our latest bracket. Why not North Carolina? Well, the Tar Heels have worse numbers than Michigan State, almost across the board. And yes, North Carolina has “looked better” in abstract, but that’s been against a significantly weaker ACC — and, frankly, a Duke team that’s highly inconsistent and a bit overrated. if Michigan State loses today to Ohio State, then UNC probably slips by them, but I still think that the Spartans are a better resume choice than North Carolina. Elsewhere, Ohio State falls to eight on the S-curve, so they get plopped into Kentucky’s bracket.

MY FRIEND THE UPSET: Personally, I’m looking forward to some upsets, just to knock the bottom of the bubble out of contention. I’ve chuckled at the TV talking heads talking about Northwestern, Seton Hall, Virginia, and Colorado State being in trouble — folks, they’re all in. The quality of the bubble is so bad that our lower-level play-in game consists of Texas and Arizona, neither of whom should be sniffing the tournament in a normal year. So the thought here is that upsets need to start happening in otherwise one-bid leagues. We lost one of those on Saturday when Murray State held on to win the Ohio Valley Conference. We’ve got another one on the slate today, as Creighton (who’s in regardless) faces off against Illinois State. Haters of bad bubble teams, root vociferously for the Redbirds! There are a few other possibilities – Harvard *might* warrant an at-large (although I doubt it), Long Beach State *might* warrant an at-large (again, doubt it), and…well, that might be it for the smaller conferences. The next chance at knocking out bad bubble teams might be upsets in the Mountain West, A-10, and Conference USA.

LAST FOUR IN/OUT: My last four in were (in order) Seton Hall, St. Joseph’s, Arizona, and Texas. I’m not impressed with any of these teams, but they have a better case than the first four out which are Xavier, Miami, South Florida, and UCF. It’s a very fluid situation, though. Xavier has been in every field I’ve put together so far, but their continued struggles against subpar competition were finally too much to handle. Of the “out” group, I think Xavier’s got the best chance of moving back up. For the curious, the next four out were Oregon, Tennessee, VCU, and Illinois.

Time for another CrimsonCast Live, as we get set for the big game against Michigan State (and the equally big game this Sunday versus Purdue). Derek Schultz from 1260 WNDE joins the program, as do a couple of Michigan State callers. We talk about the tournament implications of these games, the surprising trends that the Spartans have experienced at Assembly Hall, and the nature of the program that Tom Izzo has built at Michigan State. We also talk about the importance of Christian Watford and Jordan Hulls in this game, as well as the consistency of Cody Zeller. All that and more, on this edition of CrimsonCast Live.

CrimsonCast Live 02-27-12 [ 1:29:49 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (154)

There was a lot of chaos in college basketball this past week, with teams putting themselves in good position (Kansas, Miami, South Florida, Washington, Iowa State, Purdue), falling off the table (California, Middle Tennessee State, Connecticut, George Mason), and in some rare cases, doing both in an eight-day period (Iowa, Illinois). Let’s take a look at the most recent bracket projection:

Scrambling the Top: As has been the case for the last month, Kentucky seems locked in the South and Syracuse in the East — although Kyle brings up an interesting point in that Kentucky is actually closer to St. Louis than Atlanta, so we might see the NCAA put Kentucky there. Either way, those two teams are set. But the next six spots are a huge jumbled mess right now, and it’s hard to say who emerges in what order at this stage. This week, as it was last week, the last two #1 seeds go to Michigan State and Duke, who both have sizable resume advantages. To my mind, Kansas is next in line, so they get the “5th 1 seed” status in the West, opposite Duke. Missouri ranks next, then UNC. Why are the Tar Heels so low? A lack of Top 50 wins — among the fewest in the RPI top 20. Ohio State rounds up the pack in 8th…but Ohio State could still get a 1 seed if they beat Michigan State on the road and then follow that up by getting to the Big Ten title game.

That’s Logistics: Miami snuck back into the bracket with their win versus Florida State, which necessitated a huge shift in a bunch of teams’ bracket placement. Northwestern was a true 11 seed but had to be moved down two seed lines to avoid a Big Ten opponent and ended up in the play-in game — and while that violates some bracketing rules, it does so in order to NOT violate other bracketing rules; namely that the “First Four” games have to be split between Thursday and Friday sites, if not all in Friday sites (for travel purposes). But the big problem here is that the least desirable geographical pods (Portland and Albuquerque) are going to be given to the 4/5 seed pods…which is exactly where the 12 and 13 seed play-in games will end up. So what we may be looking at is the committee artificially moving play-in games up to the 11 seed line…which, frankly, defeats the purpose of having the play-in games in the first place.

Mountain Destitute: It was a rough week for The Mountain in terms of seeding. Going in to last week, the conference had a great chance of landing two protected seeds (UNLV and New Mexico). Now, they might get zero. UNLV still has a chance, but New Mexico probably topped themselves out at a 6 seed with their road losses this past week.

That’s One Solution: One of the nice things about this time of year is the conference tournaments yield upsets, which take away bubble spots, which keeps us from wasting valuable time arguing with ourselves whether Washington deserves that last bid over Colorado State. As of now, I am hoping for three major upsets which turn one-bid leagues into multi-bid leagues — that would clear quite a bit of the chaff off the bottom of the bubble. The conferences with the best chances for this to happen are the Ohio Valley Conference (Murray State looks ready for another loss), the West Coast Conference (can Loyola Marymount or USF string a few victories together?), the Atlantic 10 (which is a mess, but still), and Conference USA.

This Week: The teams with the best chance of improving their seeding are probably Iowa State (at Missouri, vs Baylor), Ohio State (at Northwestern, at Michigan State), Indiana (Michigan State, Purdue), Illinois (Michigan, at Wisconsin), and South Florida (at Louisville, West Virginia).

Last Four In: Miami, Xavier, Texas, Washington

Last Four Out: Colorado State, Arizona, UCF, South Florida