Our bracketology has been updated again. Duke is not in it.
This isn’t shocking news. We knew heading into the weekend that if Duke didn’t beat Louisville, this projection was a possibility. But it’s still striking, as right now two of the four longest active NCAA Tournament appearance streaks (Michigan State’s and Duke’s) are more likely to end than to persist (Kansas and Gonzaga hold the other two longest, if you’re wondering).
There’s plenty of time left, and if we were publishing probabilities (we’re not because the coronavirus has introduced too much uncertainty for us to accurately calibrate that portion of our model, at least right now) we would, at the moment, have Duke somewhere around 45% likely to keep their streak alive (the same would be true for MSU). But the fact remains that Duke’s next win over a tournament team will be their first win over a tournament team, and tournament, in this case, includes both the NCAA Tournament and the NIT, because their current best win came over a team projected to end the season something like six games under .500 overall. (What happened to Mike Brey’s program?)
Our model, of course, doesn’t deal in where things stand. It projects where things will end up. It incorporates expectations. Which means that even in a world in which Duke is currently favored in each of their next seven currently-scheduled games, our model has them more likely to miss the tournament than make it. Now, if they were to actually win those seven games, that would change: The median simulation has them going 5-2 in that span, and the average number of wins is close to 4.6. But even this shows the treacherous nature of Duke’s position: The Blue Devils could go 5-2 over their next seven and still be right where they are (and for what it’s worth, the best win in those seven would be a home game against UNC, not too far from the bubble themselves).
Moving Up: Oklahoma
The Sooners have had their work cut out for them this year, playing in a league in which half of the teams are routine appearers in our model’s top four or five seed lines.
So far, so good, and Saturday’s win was a transformer.
For a long time, we thought the Sooners’ schedule was likely too difficult for them to make the field. We were curious if they’d miss the NIT, even, given the possibility they could finish significantly far under .500 overall while losing only to tournament teams (and many high seeds, at that).
They have proven us wrong.
Saturday’s victory over Kansas was OU’s second over one of the Big 12’s heavyweights, and it pushes them high enough in our impressions of them that their median finish in conference play is now 10-8. They’re closer to the tail end of that fabled top five in KenPom than they are to even Oklahoma State, an expected tournament team themselves.
And yet, even with all of this success…Oklahoma’s only a projected seven-seed.
The Big 12’s a hard place to play.
Moving Down: Virginia Tech, LSU
Losing at Syracuse and at Kentucky (respectively) did this. What a year we’re having.
The margins were more the problem than the losses themselves, as our model’s expectations for both the Hokies and LSU are much lower now than they were Saturday morning. Welcome back to the bubble for both.
Moving In: Rutgers, Maryland, Marshall (auto-bid), Texas State (auto-bid), Texas Southern (auto-bid), North Carolina Central (auto-bid)
Maryland would’ve been our biggest mover of the weekend had the Terrapins not started Saturday outside of the projected field. A crucial win for a team that now has road victories over Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Illinois, all projected to be seeded on the top six lines. The problem for the Terps is going to be getting enough wins in total. The Big Ten, as you may have heard, is deep. But the quality is there, and the worst loss is currently a home loss to Rutgers.
Speaking of Rutgers, the Scarlet Knights broke their five-game losing streak yesterday in Bloomington, surging back ahead of the projected cut line. With Michigan State and Minnesota currently slated to visit next, sandwiching a trip to Northwestern, Rutgers is at least narrowly favored in each of their next three, and winning even just two of those could nudge them ahead a little further.
It was a busy weekend in automatic bid movement: Marshall edged back ahead of Western Kentucky in Conference USA Tournament Title probability, even if WKU still has the better projected overall résumé (not to mention a head-to-head sweep). Georgia State got swept by Appalachian State, and while the Panthers are still probably the best team in the Sun Belt, their path to the automatic bid is now a lot more complicated than that of Texas State. Texas Southern regained favoritehood in the SWAC, winning while Southern lost. And in the MEAC, a North Carolina Central team that hasn’t played since December 12th is now the favorite, with Norfolk State dropping a pair to Coppin State up in Baltimore.
Moving Out: Duke, Richmond, Western Kentucky (auto-bid), Georgia State (auto-bid), Southern (auto-bid), Norfolk State (auto-bid)
Finally, Richmond’s loss at home to La Salle on Saturday was the worst from any bubble team, sending the Spiders full-on plummeting. They’re a projected four-seed now in our NIT Bracketology.
