Syracuse Basketball Bubble Watch Update #2

Taking a look at this year’s Syracuse basketball team, there is a lot to worry about. Can the Orange make it to the NCAA tournament with more than ten losses?

Let me preface this piece with a disclaimer: There is far too much data to write a narrative, so I am going to focus on the highlights and political aspects of the selection process for expediency purposes.

Sitting at 19-12, Syracuse basketball is hardly a lock for the NCAA tournament. What are their chances to get an at-large bid? In order to answer that, we have to check out the competition. This year, there is no shortage of bubble teams, but only 68 can make the dance.

Syracuse is playing Pittsburgh tomorrow, Wednesday, March 8 in an 8/9 matchup. The winner of that game gets to take on #1 ACC tournament seed North Carolina. Syracuse as arguably one of the hardest paths to entrance into the tournament.

My colleague David Stone took a preliminary look at the other bubble teams in comparison to Syracuse basketball last week. At the time, the thought was Syracuse would eventually make it in based on some of their strong victories, their always solid RPI, and the weakness of the bubble field. As is commonly the case, quite a few things have changed since them, the biggest being Syracuse basketball’s loss to Florida State over the weekend.

Some of you may not entirely understand how the tournament selection process works. It’s actually fairly easy: a committee of ten school athletic directors make the decisions for all 68 spots in the tournament field. They are required to select the winner of the conference tournament for the 31 conferences that have tournaments and the winner of the Ivy League regular season title, because they do not have a conference tournament. These are known as automatic bids, accounting for 32 of the 68 spots, leaving 66 left.

From there, they start selecting teams based on their overall body of work. There will be some easy selections. For one, if a team won the regular season conference title, but did not win the conference tournament, they will be in. I was unable to confirm this, but I do not know of an instance where that has not happened, ever. It may have, but I couldn’t confirm it. Then, they look at the teams with the most wins who just did not show in the tournament or win the regular season conference title; that’ll add in about a dozen more or so. Now we are getting into the 50’s. This is when the bubble starts becoming important.

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Now, there are no shortage of bracketology articles on the interwebs this time of year. You can get a hundred different ideas of who is on the bubble. In fact, as of this writing, ESPN’s famed bracketologist Joe Lunardi has Syracuse being one of the last four in the tournament. That would most likely net them a 10 or 11 seed in a region.

I am looking at the last eight spots in the tournament. I am sticking with eight based on this math:

31 conference tournament champions

1 regular season tournament champion

10 regular season conference champions that did not win the conference tournament

18 at-large locks

This gets us to 60 for the tournament. It’s completely arbitrary math, and I’m not going to bore the Syracuse fans out there with the list of those 60 and the rationale of why each of them make it and where they make it. No one wants 5000 words of prediction on a Syracuse basketball site, they want 1000 words on why Syracuse is the bestest (or at least Syracuse-based information). Point is, no one wants me to talk about the Grand Canyon University Fighting Thunder Dans, they want the ‘Cuse.

Now, Syracuse’s (19-12) main competition on the bubble appears to be the following teams (in no particular order):

Ohio State 19-12

Michigan 20-11

Oregon State 18-11

Florida 18-13

Tulsa 20-10

UConn 21-10

Gonzaga 25-7

Valparaiso 26-6

VCU 22-9

USC 20-11

Pittsburgh 20-10

South Carolina 24-7

Temple 20-10

Cincinnati 22-9

Wichita State 24-8

Alabama 17-13

Houston 22-8

George Washington 22-9

Washington 17-13

Feb 14, 2016; Chestnut Hill, MA, USA; Syracuse Orange forward Tyler Lydon (20) dunks against the Boston College Eagles during the first half at Silvio O. Conte Forum. Mandatory Credit: Mark L. Baer-USA TODAY Sports

If you are counting at home, that’s 20 teams, including Syracuse, that are squarely on the bubble for the last eight or so spots. Of course there are more, but again, we can’t spend all day reading about every team. These are the teams I have personally identified as sharing the most similarities to Syracuse basketball right now. It will change with each passing day due to performances in conference tournaments, but this is a snapshot in time before the ACC tournament begins.

Out of those 20, a few jump out as being most likely to get in. Those would include George Washington, Wichita State, Valparaiso, and Gonzaga. All small schools, all with strong resumes, and all would be strong choices for an upset watch, which both the NCAA and Las Vegas loves.

That leaves us with 16 teams and four spots. Let’s work off the assumption that the selection committee would not take more than one team from any one conference for the last four slots (favoritism must be avoided). That means only one of Ohio State/Michigan, Cincinnati/UConn/Temple/Houston/Tulsa, Alabama/South Carolina/Florida, USC/Oregon State/Washington, and of course Syracuse/Pittsburgh. That accounts for 14 of the remaining 16 teams. The last team is VCU in the Atlantic-10.

To start, if VCU gets in, it won’t be taking the spot of a larger conference team out of that list, it would be bumping one of the first four of George Washington, Wichita State, Valparaiso, or Gonzaga. So the question is, out of the big conference options, which four could make it?

For these each of these groupings, the bubble is directly related to their performance in their conference tournaments. For instance, the Big Ten has Michigan and Ohio State, if both lose in their first conference tournament game, there is a chance they both miss out on the Big Dance. Both have a good chance to lose playing Northwestern and Penn State, respectively; however, I bet both win their first games, then lose to the #1 and #2 seeds in the next round.

Prediction: Michigan and Ohio State are out; the selection committee just isn’t that into you.

The American Athletic Conference (AAC) has five teams from this list in Cincinnati, UConn, Temple, Houston, and Tulsa. These are the top five seeds in the AAC tournament. This is where is gets dicey for the other teams on the bubble as one team must make it and there is a very small chance of a team other than these five winning the conference tournament. Temple is the #1 seed, Houston is #2, Tulsa #3. Cincinnati and UConn are playing each other in the 4/5 game, winner takes on either Temple, or if the unthinkable happens, either #8 ECU or #9 USF.

I am going to go out on a limb and say whichever team wins the Cincinnati/UConn matchup goes on to win the tournament, making Temple a Big Dance lock in one of those regular-season-conference-champs-who-couldn’t-win-the-conference-tournament slots. I’ll also predict Cincinnati to pull out the conference tournament crown.

Prediction: Cincinnati gets the automatic bid, Temple gets an at-large for winning the regular season championship, and Houston gets the bubble slot for being in the AAC championship game.

If you are following, this means only one of the last four bubble slots have been filled with Houston.

Out of the SEC teams, the only way Florida or Alabama get in is to make a very strong showing in the tournament and other at-large teams crash and burn, or one of them wins the tournament. If neither do, and South Carolina does not pull it off as the #3 seed, then South Carolina is most likely sneak in. They have played the strongest schedule with the best results and have made some noise at different times in the polls.

Prediction: Alabama and Florida fail miserably and South Carolina gets in because they have made noise throughout the season.

The Pac-12 is an interesting animal because of the alleged east coast bias that exists in college basketball. Does it exist? Maybe. Do I think it exists? After a decade in Arizona, I absolutely do. If it weren’t for regional CBS and Fox Sports channels, I would never see anyone except Kentucky, Kansas, Duke, and North Carolina play. With that said, USC is the best of this group and has the easiest path to the conference championship game. So, it would not surprise me to see them get an at-large bid with a win against UCLA and a good showing against Utah.

Prediction: USC, because the committee is fighting the east coast bias argument and USC will show the best of this group.

That leaves one more bubble slot and only two teams, Syracuse and Pittsburgh. Doesn’t this seem to happen too often? What is the deal with Pittsburgh and Syracuse always being so similar and hanging on the bubble together? They even get to play each other tomorrow in their opening ACC tournament game.

This is the type of storyline you read in a book or see on the big screen. This will play out one way only: whichever team wins this game gets in the tournament. It’s that simple, except when it isn’t. Don’t forget, a lot of crazy things can happen when hundreds of teams are playing in other tournaments as well. With that said, the entire season comes down to this game.

Barring external factors, the winner of this game would be a lock to get into the tournament. The loser would need a lot of help. With that said, it’s important to note that the committee recognizes the value of ACC teams, and although the committee rarely lets a conference field more than seven teams, this year’s ACC conference could get eight or more in if the right dominoes were to fall in the right way.

So, to talk about tomorrow’s game. Syracuse is 15-16 against the spread, Pittsburgh is 15-15. Syracuse is 1-4 in its last five games, Pittsburgh is 2-3, with wins over Syracuse and Duke. Pittsburgh is 2-0 on neutral courts, Syracuse is 3-1. Pittsburgh averages 6.1 more points per game. Syracuse is better defensively, Pittsburgh is better on the glass. Both teams are wildly athletic though.

In general, it should be a good game. Vegas has not released odds for the game yet, but I expect Pittsburgh to open as the favorite by roughly 3.5 points. My early prediction is one of pure homerism as I’ll pick Syracuse to not only win, but do so in convincing fashion. The numbers tell me I’m wrong, but I think the Tylers are going to show up as they have in all of Syracuse’s other big wins.

That would make Syracuse basketball the final bubble team with Houston, South Carolina, USC, George Washington, Valparaiso, Gonzaga, and Wichita State. Be a fan – Go ‘Cuse!