Lunardi Says..

[Windyplayer]

I've always wondered if Lunardi looked for storylines in his brackets. I remember being paired against IU in one. There was another where X and Arizona (former X coach) were in line to play in the second round. There have been others. Probably coincidence but you never know

Why not. He should take liberties with the match-ups just so long as the seeds are reasonable. Nobody will hold him accountable for the same well over a month before the bracket starts to really take shape.

[Galway Eagle]

I read somewhere that the ncaa tries to avoid matchups like that in the opening rounds, try to avoid former coaches playing old schools, schools in the same conference, schools that played each other that year etc

[fjm]

I read somewhere that the ncaa tries to avoid matchups like that in the opening rounds, try to avoid former coaches playing old schools, schools in the same conference, schools that played each other that year etc

Really hoping to avoid VT and IU in the first round if we make the tourney.

Would it be great to beat them? Of course!!

Would we all have a meltdown if we don't?
Most likely. And the amount of "we should get buzz back!" Threads would be obnoxious.

[Benny B]

I read somewhere that the ncaa tries to avoid matchups like that in the opening rounds, try to avoid former coaches playing old schools, schools in the same conference, schools that played each other that year etc

No, yes, and yes.

It's important to understand the process: 1) Select 2) Seed 3) Bracket

The committee starts the balloting process for at-large teams about a week before they meet in Indy.  By the time "Selection Friday" rolls around, there may be one or two teams that are still on the bubble subject to the results of the remaining conference tourney games, but the field of 68 is pretty much set at that point, or at least close enough so that they can start seeding everyone 1-68, which is probably the easiest of the three steps but also the most repetitive as there may be multiple iterations as the horns sound on the games yet to be played.  Once the teams are seeded (or mostly seeded), they start bracketing the teams, even if seeding isn't quite finalized (but is close).  Frankly, I'd love to see what some of those brackets look like... I'm thinking it's along the lines of Nash's "workshop" in A Beautiful mind with half the teams filled in and a bunch of string and arrows connecting the rest.

While the committee may have multiple iterations of "hypothetical" brackets on the table at any point (some of which will be sent to the circular as game results come in), remember that 14 conferences have their champion decided on "Selection Saturday" and 5 are decided on Sunday... in other words, at 8:00 a.m. on Saturday morning, there are still 29 games left to be played; if you were to draw up brackets to cover every possible combination of results that remained, even if 26 of those games are inconsequential, that's still 8 brackets you have to draw up.

Saturday is the calm before the storm... after the BE final is when the fun scramble chaos starts. 

With five games remaining, the committee is going to start drawing up a bracket late Saturday or early Sunday and filling it in as best they can.  One of those five is the Sun Belt championship, so they're going to slot an AQ somewhere and focus on the remaining four championships: AAC, Big Televentwelveen, SEC and A-10.  Depending on how the chips fall, these outcomes typically have minimal effect on the bracket, in which case the committee will presume a set of outcomes and finish the bracket accordingly, and if an unexpected result arises, at most they might flip-flop a team, seedline, pod, etc.  But if there is a cinderella, or even two, remaining that could pull a major Sunday upset, that could throw everything off.

Now, most of the committee "guidelines" don't come into play until step 3; so not only is that the most complicated step, it's also the step which has the least amount of time to completed, not to mention a firm deadline.  The less the committee has to consider in step 3, the better.

Point being, the committee doesn't have enough time to consider "storylines" and research coaches' employment histories when drawing up the bracket.  They barely have enough time to focus on:

1) Avoiding home-crowd advantages for protected seeds (1-4), e.g. don't put 14-seed Dayton in Columbus against 3-seed UCLA.
2) Looking to see where teams have played opening rounds in the last couple tournaments (the oft ignored "Send-Marquette-to-the-West-Coast" guideline)
3) Avoiding regular season rematches (with appropriate round dependent upon how many times teams played).
4) Avoiding tournament rematches (from past couple years)

[Juan Anderson's Mixtape]

Great explanation Benny.  The storylines are like playing 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon.  The college basketball world is so connected that storylines just so happen to be there.

[BM1090]

Even after yesterday's loss, Lunardi had us at 29 on his S curve. The highest 8 seed.

[fjm]

Even after yesterday's loss, Lunardi had us at 29 on his S curve. The highest 8 seed.

Is that updated?

[BM1090]

Is that updated?

He tweeted it out as "Sunday seed list". So it should be updated.

[fjm]

He tweeted it out as "Sunday seed list". So it should be updated.

Saaaaawwwwweeeeet!

[GoldenDieners32]

New Bracket from lunardi today. Still has us as a 8 seed, except playing Arkansas this time

[GoldenDieners32]

Also Arkansas does not have a ton of height either like us. They have a 6'10" kid, 6'9" and a couple 6'8"

[GoldenDieners32]

New Bracket from lunardi today. Still has us as a 8 seed, except playing Arkansas this time

Also if MU would make it to the sweet 16 they would either play Notre Dame or Wisconsin

[MUFlutieEffect]

Also if MU would make it to the sweet 16 they would either play Notre Dame or Wisconsin

Or Valpo... Or maybe the Zips...

[MerrittsMustache]

A win over the potential #1 overall seed will have a significantly greater impact than a loss to a decent conference opponent. Prov at home is a game that MU should win but it's not the type of game that is going to be a "bad loss" at the end of the season. The Nova win is the type of W than can raise a team several spots on the S curve. The Prov loss is a shrug.

[muguru]

A win over the potential #1 overall seed will have a significantly greater impact than a loss to a decent conference opponent. Prov at home is a game that MU should win but it's not the type of game that is going to be a "bad loss" at the end of the season. The Nova win is the type of W than can raise a team several spots on the S curve. The Prov loss is a shrug.

However, what that Providence loss could do is, let's say MU stays right where they are the rest of the year..seed #29..(1st 8 seed), what it could do is knock MU off the 7 line(Say 27th, 28th) and if MU is going to be in the tournament anyway, then wouldn't we much rather they NOT be on the 8/9 line?? I sure would.

[MarquetteDano]

However, what that Providence loss could do is, let's say MU stays right where they are the rest of the year..seed #29..(1st 8 seed), what it could do is knock MU off the 7 line(Say 27th, 28th) and if MU is going to be in the tournament anyway, then wouldn't we much rather they NOT be on the 8/9 line?? I sure would.g

I think what everyone is saying  is that better we beat Nova and lose to Prov than the other way around.

[GGGG]

Look when the Creighton game tipped off on January 21, all of us would have been happy with 2-1 over our next three.  Scratch that...we would have been thrilled!

Yeah it sucks that we lost the easiest game to win on paper.  However I gladly would take that loss if it means keeping the Nova win.  That was special.

Look, MU has done what it needs to go to get into the tournament.  Win the games we are supposed to win, and MU is in the dance.  All of us would have taken that at the beginning of the year.

[Herman Cain]

Lets just win the next game versus The Johnnies. That will be a solid road victory in the Garden.

[TAMU, Knower of Ball]

However, what that Providence loss could do is, let's say MU stays right where they are the rest of the year..seed #29..(1st 8 seed), what it could do is knock MU off the 7 line(Say 27th, 28th) and if MU is going to be in the tournament anyway, then wouldn't we much rather they NOT be on the 8/9 line?? I sure would.

So is this a fancy way of saying it is better to beat Providence than lose to them? Because I think all of us would agree with that. Of course, all of us (I assume) would rather beat Nova and lose to Providence than they other way around.

[MuMark]

I'm not moving the goal posts.......if we get in I'm happy and its been a great year. Don't care about the seed.

[Babybluejeans]

if we get in I'm happy and its been a great year. Don't care about the seed.

Hear hear.

[mu03eng]

Keep in mind that not only is the schedule easier in the 2nd half because the teams are not as good, but also because the match ups for MU are more favorable. Providence and Xavier(with Sumner) are probably the toughest match-ups for MU. If X has to shut down Sumner, MU could theoretically be favored in 7 of our last 9, with only @X and @Georgetown not being favored. (Providence is a worse match up for MU than Georgetown, but that's not how Vegas works)

[Newsdreams]

I'm not moving the goal posts.......if we get in I'm happy and its been a great year. Don't care about the seed.

Yes progress...

[JamilJaeJamailJrJuan]

I'm not moving the goal posts.......if we get in I'm happy and its been a great year. Don't care about the seed.

Touche.  Just get me there and let me enjoy the fun of having my team in the dance.  I'd love a good draw, but you can't be greedy.

[Windyplayer]

Yes progress...

Absolutely. It's fine to hope, but regardless of what happens in March (and April  ), I'm content with a berth.