Saturday Bracketology 2/29/2020

Austin Walther February 29, 2020 10:09 am

Today would be March if it weren’t for leap year. It’s always better when March 1 falls on a Saturday. There’s a full day of college hoops and it’s officially the greatest month of the year. But nope, it’s February 29. Anywho, there’s still a great day. But let’s do some explaining.

I went back and looked at last year’s spreadsheet and crunched some numbers. My made up adjusted winning percentage actually held up. For the most part. Two teams I considered were left out with Clemson and NC State. The Tigers had 13 losses and the Pack’s SOS was in the 300s. The lowest mark among at-large teams in my adjusted winning percentage rankings was Florida. Providence is going to have a tough time getting in. Sorry, Friars. You went from a 9 seed to last 4 in.

Speaking of a team that was seeded on the 8/9 line, Rutgers fell out. All of the Bracketologists on twitter Wednesday night were killing off the Scarlet Knights. They’ve been in the business longer than I have so I followed suit. But Rutgers is under five in the adjusted winning percentage and in large part that has to do with just one road win. And that was at Nebraska. Arkansas seemed to be the favorite people wanted to put back into the field. The Razorbacks are a totally different team when their star Isaiah Joe plays.

The whole jumping on UCLA’s bandwagon is actually for real. I never received any form of payment from Bill Walton that I can remember and they’re still among my first 8 out. The Bruins are beating good Pac-12 teams lately and are tied for first in the conference, but the metrics still don’t like what they did earlier this season. That’s one thing I’ll point out. UCLA and Oregon are tied for first in the Pac-12. Everyone has their ways of tiebreakers. Mine is NET position. Others are different. So you might see UCLA in a lot of fields due to giving them the automatic bid.

This is our second to last Saturday of college hoops regular season action. Ten conferences are wrapping up play today. One ends Thursday, two on Friday, everyone else besides the American and Big Ten next Saturday and then those two Sunday.

No Disney on Ice this week so expect my full presence on Twitter and as always, check us all out on the Bracket Matrix.

Midwest

  1. Kansas
  2. Siena/NC Central

  3. Illinois

  4. Virginia

  5. Iowa

  6. Rhode Island/USC

  7. Kentucky

  8. New Mexico State

  9. Wisconsin

  10. Stanford

  11. Villanova

  12. Hofstra

  13. Butler

  14. Arkansas

  15. Florida State

  16. South Dakota State

South

  1. Baylor

  2. St. Francis PA/Prairie View A&M

  3. Saint Mary’s

  4. Xavier

  5. Michigan State

  6. Northern Iowa

  7. Auburn

  8. North Texas

  9. Arizona

  10. Wichita State/Providence

  11. Louisville

  12. Bowling Green

  13. Florida

  14. Arizona State

  15. Maryland

  16. UC Irvine

West

  1. Gonzaga

  2. Little Rock

  3. LSU

  4. Oklahoma

  5. Ohio State

  6. Yale

  7. Oregon

  8. Vermont

  9. Colorado

  10. Utah State

  11. Duke

  12. Belmont

  13. Michigan

  14. Cincinnati

  15. Creighton

  16. Wright State

East

  1. San Diego State

  2. Radford

  3. Houston

  4. Texas Tech

  5. West Virginia

  6. Liberty

  7. Penn State

  8. Stephen F. Austin

  9. BYU

  10. East Tennessee State

  11. Seton Hall

  12. Northern Colorado

  13. Marquette

  14. Indiana

  15. Dayton

  16. Colgate

 

Last four byes

Cincinnati
Arkansas
Stanford
Utah State

Last four in

Wichita State
Providence
Rhode Island
USC

First four out

Rutgers
Mississippi State
NC State
Alabama

Next four out

Richmond
South Carolina
UCLA
Purdue

Photo courtesy of ArkansasRazorbacks.com