March 18, 201313 yr Easily? I tend to disagree. Louisville already ran them out of the gym once. Pressey was virtually ineffective, and UL's post play is far better. Easily as in "conceivable to beat". I am not sure Missouri will even make it to UL. Similar to last year when people were saying to watch out for for UConn in UK's bracket second round.
March 18, 201313 yr 2, 3 & 4 in that bracket had 22 loses. 2, 3 & 4 in this bracket have 19 loses. Duke, until this weekend, was either the first or second overall seed in many people's estimation. Also, look at the seed tiers as a group: 2's: Duke, OSU, Miami & Georgetown- in my opinion, Louisville has the best #2 seed as a possible opponent, with an added bonus of it being a rematch game. 3's: Marquette, Michigan State, New Mexico & Florida- again, I think Louisville has the best team in that group in their region. 4's: Michigan, Kansas St, Syracuse, St Louis- here, I think Louisville would rather see St Louis than Syracuse again or Michigan, but I think St Louis is also a matchup challenge for the Cards pressure and still a more difficult opponent than Kansas St. The 2011 OSU draw is more difficult to evaluate due to the knowledge of what actually happened, but I will say that even before their title run Connecticut would have been a tougher three IMO than Syracuse and I thought Florida was at least as good as UNC. Ok, in my estimation that bracket was tougher. tOSU was better than UL. UNC was rolling with a talented roster and were close to a #1 before falling in the ACC final. If you think that Florida team was just as good as UNC you must have taken off the last few weeks of the season from watching the Gators. Syracuse was what they always are. UK was a 3 seed seed that had to be shifted to a 4 because of the seeding rules. To compensate for the tough schedule UL is also driving 1 hour and 1.5 hours to play their games. They would not trade that to be in a worse bracket in Casper, WY or wherever the teams are being shipped to this season. tOSU got shipped to New Jersey and got hosed in that respect. But in fairness it was in a whacky season where on brackets were held in the midwest area. Both are tough obviously.
March 18, 201313 yr That 538 guy, Nate Silver, who did so well forecasting the Presidential Election, has as his Final Four: Louisville (53% chance to win Midwest), Florida (37% chance to win South), Indiana (51% chance to win East), & Gonzaga (33% chance to win West). Do we know what he projected last year?
March 18, 201313 yr A couple things... -MTSU does not belong in this tourney and any reasoning for that opinion is just laughable. Unfortunately, as Jay Bilas put it, it wasn't about who you beat this year--it was "who did you lose to". -UL fans complaining about facing (most likely) Mizzou, SLU, and Duke/MSU is shameful. A number one overall seed doesn't mean you get a cake walk to the Final Four. Proven last year when UK played ISU, Baylor, Indiana and UL. Stop whining and just win some ball games. Bring a title back to the bluegrass if you want to be respected. -This is the most even field in a while so I really feel it is anyones tourney. I feel like Zona could make some noise in the west. They will be playing with a chip on their shoulder and looking for vengence. -The keys to do well in this tourney are good pg play, role players raising their level of play, and tempo control. The winner of this tourney will be who takes care of the ball, and who doesn't allow big runs. My championship game is Duke and Florida!!
March 18, 201313 yr A couple things... -MTSU does not belong in this tourney and any reasoning for that opinion is just laughable. Unfortunately, as Jay Bilas put it, it wasn't about who you beat this year--it was "who did you lose to". I'd rather put MTSU in the field who beat everyone they were supposed to beat minus the conference tournament than an SEC team who played in a mediocre at best conference and still couldn't win games. And didn't have big non conference Wins. The problem here is that the committee has to deal with uneven scheduling. If you were a pre season top 20 team, why would you pay MTSU to come to your house when you know they are a solid team and all it is is an opportunity for a 'bad loss?' Even better, no top 20 team with a lick of sense is going to actually GO to MTSU. That's bracket suicide. So they scheduled who they could, and did well with it. It kills me the people that say "Well MTSU didn't play anyone." They can't play people that won't schedule them. Now, had one of those SEC bubble teams capitalized on ANY of the chances they got to win non conference games OR consistently win on the road, then MTSU is out... But, they didn't, so they aren't. Pretty much it comes down to we know those bubble burst teams are mediocre, we don't really know that this 28-4 mid major team is. They did consistently win on the road, the SEC didn't. Even though the quality of competition wasn't significantly raised.
March 18, 201313 yr Do we know what he projected last year? I admittedly didn't look very hard for this, but I did look & couldn't find anything. Let us know if you do find that info. :thumb:
March 18, 201313 yr I'd rather put MTSU in the field who beat everyone they were supposed to beat minus the conference tournament than an SEC team who played in a mediocre at best conference and still couldn't win games. And didn't have big non conference Wins. The problem here is that the committee has to deal with uneven scheduling. If you were a pre season top 20 team, why would you pay MTSU to come to your house when you know they are a solid team and all it is is an opportunity for a 'bad loss?' Even better, no top 20 team with a lick of sense is going to actually GO to MTSU. That's bracket suicide. So they scheduled who they could, and did well with it. It kills me the people that say "Well MTSU didn't play anyone." They can't play people that won't schedule them. Now, had one of those SEC bubble teams capitalized on ANY of the chances they got to win non conference games OR consistently win on the road, then MTSU is out... But, they didn't, so they aren't. Pretty much it comes down to we know those bubble burst teams are mediocre, we don't really know that this 28-4 mid major team is. They did consistently win on the road, the SEC didn't. Even though the quality of competition wasn't significantly raised. The smartest thing you said was in the last sentence. MTSU had 1, count it, 1 top 100 win. UK had four. I just believe you shouldn't be rewarded for playing no one, just my opinion though.
March 18, 201313 yr The committee greatly emphasized wins away from home more so than quality wins in general. People can agree & disagree about what they chose to emphasize, but this seemed to be one of the best brackets they've put out in a while IMO. They were consistent in the standards they used.
March 18, 201313 yr My biggest regret? With the #1 overall seed, we will never get to see UofL wear the road version of those turrrrible Adidas uniforms!!!
March 18, 201313 yr The smartest thing you said was in the last sentence. MTSU had 1, count it, 1 top 100 win. UK had four. I just believe you shouldn't be rewarded for playing no one, just my opinion though. Wasn't just talking about UK, but in general... UK, Tennessee, Alabama, etc. or the ACC's Virginia, Maryland, etc. And yes they did have 4. 4 out of how many opportunities. How many on the road?
March 18, 201313 yr My biggest regret? With the #1 overall seed, we will never get to see UofL wear the road version of those turrrrible Adidas uniforms!!! Will they wear the same uniforms they wore during the conference tournament like last season? Edited March 18, 201313 yr by bugatti
March 18, 201313 yr Will the wear the same uniforms they wore during the conference tournament like last season? Yes.
March 18, 201313 yr My biggest regret? With the #1 overall seed, we will never get to see UofL wear the road version of those turrrrible Adidas uniforms!!! Should UL wear any of those eye sore unis then they deserve to lose :lol2:, same with ND and Cincy.
March 18, 201313 yr Wasn't just talking about UK, but in general... UK, Tennessee, Alabama, etc. or the ACC's Virginia, Maryland, etc. And yes they did have 4. 4 out of how many opportunities. How many on the road? As mentioned before, I'm not really gung ho about this fight, but here are the numbers for those interested. Using the final RPI numbers: Against Top 50 UK - 3-4 (1-3 on the road + 1 neutral loss) MTSU - 1-3 (0-3 on the road) Against Top 100 UK - 7-9 (2-6 on the road + 1 neutral win & 1 neutral loss) MTSU - 1-3 (0-3 on the road) Against 101-150 UK - 2-2 (1-1 on the road + 1 neutral loss) MTSU - 6-1 (2-0 on the road + 1 neutral win & 1 neutral loss) Against Sub-150 UK - 12-0 (1-0 on the road) MTSU - 21-1 (9-1 on the road + 1 neutral win) MTSU had the worst loss and their best win was UK's third best win - but UK did it on the road.
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