Sure it's early but what's the board for but to speculate and hope...
The BE is well represented with 5 of the top 12 and a 6th at 23. If past performance is an indication of future results...and the committee mirrors somewhat the current Lunardi view, no more than 8 BE teams will make it.
Let's give six spots to those referenced above:
1. #4 Villanova
2. #5 Syracuse
3. #8 West Virginia
4. #10 Pittsburgh
5. #12 Georgetown
6. #23 Connecticut
The next list of five is my own subjective ranking of teams, based on both performance and projections (subject to debate) and shakes out like this:
7. Louisville
8. Marquette
9. Notre Dame
10. Cincinnati
11. Providence
12. Seton Hall
13. St. John's
That leaves MU fighting hard with 'Ville, ND, and Cincy for two spots and likely two of those teams OUT. The other three listed probably would rank themselves higher than I did and have dreams of dancing too. Also the chances of just 7 being selected are probably greater than 9. It's tight. And there is little margin for error.
Keep in mind that the tourney committee has a history of elevating teams with players on their roster that the public wants to see.
Right now Harangody is, statistically, one of the best players in college basketball and he's a "human-interest-piece" of sorts in that he bypassed the draft (albeit because he knew he wasn't lottery material) to return for his senior season...
Short of ND tanking down the stretch or MU winning one of its bigger road games (UConn / Syracuse), I wouldn't be surprised if ND got the nod ahead of us simply because of Harangody's stature in the college b-ball community...
Also, Cinci does have a potential lottery pick in Lance Stephenson that the committee may decide they want to showcase in the tournament as well...
So I say MU should just go out, run the table, and leave no doubt on selection sunday! :)
Quote from: MU_Iceman on January 14, 2010, 04:20:22 PM
So I say MU should just go out, run the table, and leave no doubt on selection sunday! :)
Only one thing left to do....
(http://blogs.suburbanchicagonews.com/sportsbeacon/Jake%20Taylor.jpg)
Win the whole.....[expletive].....thing...
We should not talk about the tournament until we are .500 in league play.
And if we never get to .500 then we deny ourselves the chance to talk about it? As stated originally, speculation and hope is what this board (and this thread) are all about. Debbie Downer.
The Pac-10 might only put two or three teams in. It would not be a huge stretch for the other major conferences to put more teams in this year.
Quote from: notkirkcameron on January 14, 2010, 05:51:33 PM
Only one thing left to do....
(http://blogs.suburbanchicagonews.com/sportsbeacon/Jake%20Taylor.jpg)
Win the whole.....[expletive].....thing...
Perfect. Just [expletive] perfect.