Bubble Watch

hhcmatt · March 12, 2014

Mount St. Mary's (16-16) upset Robert Morris but RM isn't good enough for an at-large

GoBigRed · March 12, 2014

Highly unlikely we get matched up with Creighton in second or third round, considering Ras is on the committee and you know he would not want to set up Creighton in that scenario. Funny thing is I actually think we have a great roster to match up with Creighton (when we don't play with our underwear over our heads like we did in our first road game this season). Tall, athletic guards that can score at the rim is exactly what they can't defend. Unfortunately we hadn't figured out that was our strength yet at that point in the season and Shields was nowhere near as good as he is now.

Anyway, everything continues to go extremely well for us on the Bubble Watch. North Dakota State won Summit League. Gonzaga won WCC. Only Southern Miss (CUSA), Louisiana Tech (CUSA), Toledo (MAC), and Stephen F. Austin (Southland) are remote bubble candidates left from smaller conferences, and most of those are even unlikely bids/don't have a better resume than Nebraska anyway.

It's really looking like there could be 22 1-bid leagues. Then there are 10 major conference champions who we hope come from teams already in the field. That leaves 36 spots for about 43 legitimate bubble contenders according to ESPN's Bubble Watch. Some of those 43 teams are Dayton, St. Joseph's Minnesota, California, Pittsburgh, Florida State, Xavier, Providence, Georgetown, St. John's, BYU, Arkansas, Missouri...we are in pretty good shape.

49r · March 12, 2014

Any noteworthy bubble games today? I took a very quick look and USC over Colorado, Texas Tech over Oklahoma State, DePaul over Georgetown, and Washington St over Stanford seem like teams to root for. At this point I suppose these games are more for Nebraska to avoid the play-in round, instead of simply getting an at-large bid.

I would love to see it, but USC is horrible. Just absolute trash. Pac 12 basketball is hard to watch.

GoBigRed · March 12, 2014

Any noteworthy bubble games today? I took a very quick look and USC over Colorado, Texas Tech over Oklahoma State, DePaul over Georgetown, and Washington St over Stanford seem like teams to root for. At this point I suppose these games are more for Nebraska to avoid the play-in round, instead of simply getting an at-large bid.

I would love to see it, but USC is horrible. Just absolute trash. Pac 12 basketball is hard to watch.

It is interesting how difference conferences have different styles and beauty is in the eye of the beholder. For example, some (uneducated) people rip on the Big Ten for its low scores and bad offense (tough defense, but whatever).

Then I watched a Big East game over the weekend (St. John's-Marquette) and it had the feel of an NBA game. Running up and down the court, jacking up shots early in the shot clock. These guys were throwing one-handed bounce passes from one wing to the other, through the free throw arc, in the half-court offense. You would never, ever see that even attempted in the Big Ten. One team would get up by 5-6 points, then it would be tied quickly, then the other team up by 5-6 points and so on. Neither team had much interest in getting all 5 guys back on defense in a timely fashion either. Crowd wasn't really interested until the final minutes. Personally, I thought it was ugly as hell. In the Big Ten, if you get down by 6-8 points on the road, you basically feel like you're done.

49r · March 12, 2014

Any noteworthy bubble games today? I took a very quick look and USC over Colorado, Texas Tech over Oklahoma State, DePaul over Georgetown, and Washington St over Stanford seem like teams to root for. At this point I suppose these games are more for Nebraska to avoid the play-in round, instead of simply getting an at-large bid.

I would love to see it, but USC is horrible. Just absolute trash. Pac 12 basketball is hard to watch.

It is interesting how difference conferences have different styles and beauty is in the eye of the beholder. For example, some (uneducated) people rip on the Big Ten for its low scores and bad offense (tough defense, but whatever).

Then I watched a Big East game over the weekend (St. John's-Marquette) and it had the feel of an NBA game. Running up and down the court, jacking up shots early in the shot clock. These guys were throwing one-handed bounce passes from one wing to the other, through the free throw arc, in the half-court offense. You would never, ever see that even attempted in the Big Ten. One team would get up by 5-6 points, then it would be tied quickly, then the other team up by 5-6 points and so on. Neither team had much interest in getting all 5 guys back on defense in a timely fashion either. Crowd wasn't really interested until the final minutes. Personally, I thought it was ugly as hell. In the Big Ten, if you get down by 6-8 points on the road, you basically feel like you're done.

Yeah, I should probably have added the caveat that it's hard for me to watch. Lots of up and down and turnovers and clanked shots. Apart from Arizona, it's just ugly, IMO.

Say what you will about the pace of some B1G games, but the strength of each teams' fundamentals makes it a much more enjoyable game for me to watch.

Silverbacked1 · March 12, 2014

the guy who does the NIT Brackets does not have us listed any longer, but does have Minn., Ill. Ind., I didn't see anybody else but really didn't look that hard.

doc1394 · March 12, 2014

I'm not bracketologist, but here is how I see us wanting the games to go today: