And that wasn’t opening bars in the weeks before the purported “bubble” gets blown.
Bracketology (Week of March 1st)
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Bill Walton on ESPN’s Daily Wager show just listed Illinois as #2 on his top 5 list — behind Gonzaga and in front of Baylor, Michigan and Florida State.
altenberger22
- South Carolina
Bill -- my man!! Love you bro!!!
um, no. go replay the AZ E8 game
SampsonRelpenk
- Edwardsville, IL
To break our seven year* tournament drought by crashing the party as the last 1-seed would really be something. Almost Illinois Football-like.
*obviously we would have been selected if the tournament happened last year
*obviously we would have been selected if the tournament happened last year
altenberger22
- South Carolina
Sorry, I appreciate John Wooden, the UCLA Bruin dynasty, guys who partied with Ray Manzarek of the Doors, and wacky color commentators. (Oh yeah, and he loves & respects our Illini basketball history.)
Alabama is good candidate to win out IMO. I see Arkansas as their main competition for SEC tourney...and they have their own National coach of year candidate with Oates.
I think it's collapse AND one of those others win out. Collapse = lose to OSU and lose 1st round game in BTT.
Retro62
- North Bethesda, Maryland
Just take a moment to remember where we were just a few seasons ago when BU took the job...now we’re playing for a #1 seed in The Dance. Amazing turnaround by everyone involved in the program, and a testament to the players who just kept working. I know Ayo is an Illinois basketball god now...and he deserves it...but I will always love Trent and DMFW for this.
illiniCA
- DC Area
The staff is really really good
bredhartmann
- Centralia, IL
Freshly updated Bracket Matrix has us firmly in the final 1 seed position. Have to think one more win is likely enough to lock it up barring an Iowa or OSU BTT championship.
To beat ‘em all, you gotta beat ‘em all.
sacraig
- The desert
Apparently there is a bracket out there where Wisconsin doesn't make it.
JFGsCoffeeMug
BU:1 Trash cans:0
- Chicago
Yesterday there was a bracket that had us as a 5-seed. And it had been updated on 3/2. Some wacky stuff out there.
EDIT: It's the KPI one. They moved us to a 4-seed now. Getting warmer.
EDIT2: And they're the ones who left Wisconsin out entirely too. Incredible.
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I'm guessing that they are heavily based on RPI. If you look at the old school metric, Illinois is #20, Iowa is #37, Rutgers is #72, and Wisconsin is #77 and then teams like BYU (#6) and Clemson (#10) are stupidly high. The KPI bracket has both of those teams as 2 seeds, Illinois as a 4, Iowa as a 5, and Wisconsin and Rutgers missing the tournament entirely.
It makes you realize how god awful RPI was and it makes me wonder how many teams were grossly mis-seeded in years past when that was one of the main figures on team sheets for the committee.
Illini_1979
- Oregon
The"Conference of Champions"? Surely you jest.
sacraig
- The desert
These things are often cyclical. The Big Ten had a strong of down years recently, too.
Let’s volunteer for a 16 seed
And a play in game for good measure
Of course, if you beat Gonzaga in the first round (to get it out of the way), you then step into their one-seed schedule, and we don't want that...
Why not? Let's just get Baylor or Gonzaga out of the way early.
I remember when Arizona lost in the elite 8
I haven’t watched much non-BIG basketball this year, so I’ve started looking at other contenders for potential matchup problems. I think 3 types of players give us trouble:
1. Long, athletic wings (more than 1)
2. Bruising, athletic 4’s
3. Stretch 5’s
From what I can see our toughest team from a matchup perspective is still Baylor. They should still be able to disrupt our perimeter offense with their switching and we don’t really have anyone that can body up Vidal.
Alabama and Texas Tech look like strong defensive teams and have some length on the perimeter but don’t look to be overly long. FSU always seems to have a ton of rangy athletes but don’t look to be overly long this year.
Gonzaga is #1 in KenPom defense, but they don’t look overly long either. I guess Kispert is a problem for us but we just shut down Livers who seems to be a similar player. Timme is great but isn’t a stretch 5 and Kofi has greatly improved over the course of this year of not
biting on pump fakes and making guys score over him.
And every single one of those teams is going to be wondering how in the heck they are going to stop Kofi.
We can absolutely lose to any of those teams or really anybody who makes the tournament, especially Iowa, UM, or OSU. But I don’t see a ton of teams who are a bad matchup for us “on paper.”
It’s so nice to be relevant in March again and I hope we go on a run! Seem to be peaking at the right time!
1. Long, athletic wings (more than 1)
2. Bruising, athletic 4’s
3. Stretch 5’s
From what I can see our toughest team from a matchup perspective is still Baylor. They should still be able to disrupt our perimeter offense with their switching and we don’t really have anyone that can body up Vidal.
Alabama and Texas Tech look like strong defensive teams and have some length on the perimeter but don’t look to be overly long. FSU always seems to have a ton of rangy athletes but don’t look to be overly long this year.
Gonzaga is #1 in KenPom defense, but they don’t look overly long either. I guess Kispert is a problem for us but we just shut down Livers who seems to be a similar player. Timme is great but isn’t a stretch 5 and Kofi has greatly improved over the course of this year of not
biting on pump fakes and making guys score over him.
And every single one of those teams is going to be wondering how in the heck they are going to stop Kofi.
We can absolutely lose to any of those teams or really anybody who makes the tournament, especially Iowa, UM, or OSU. But I don’t see a ton of teams who are a bad matchup for us “on paper.”
It’s so nice to be relevant in March again and I hope we go on a run! Seem to be peaking at the right time!
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