Here's my question regarding the NET and Gonzaga. Does their strength of schedule from January through mid March ever catch up with them?
Week of 1/19 Bracketology
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It does, though they offset it by a crazy hard non-con SOS and dominating their conference (also their conference has been one of the top 3 mid majors the last few years, particularly with BYU and then Oregon State/Wash State). They ended up 9th in NET last year.
Last year they got an 8 seed (which, honestly, a raw deal for them opposite Houston) and gave Houston a scare in the 2nd round, the first time Gonzaga hasn't made the sweet 16 in 10 years, and have now made 27 straight tournaments.
When I did a google search of this, it came back with a result about the women's tournament selection committee doing the top 16 reveal on March 14.
The men's will probably be around February 14 or 21.
In terms of it hurting their NET ranking, not really. But it seems the committee has started docking them for it. For example, last year they were 7 in NET, 8 in KP, but their SOR was 39 so they ended up with an 8 seed.
Also, keep in mind, next year the Pac-12 will be rebuilt with:
- Oregon State (bad now, but made E8 in 2021)
- Washington State (7 seed 2 years ago, S16 in 2008)
- Gonzaga (like I said, 27 straight tournaments)
- San Diego State (made 7 of last 8 tournaments and finals in 2023)
- Utah State (made 7 of last 8 tournaments)
- Colorado State (made 3 of last 4 tournaments with Niko Medved coaching)
- Boise State (made 3 of last 4 tournaments)
- Fresno State (made tournament in 2016, won CIT in 2023)
- Texas State (basically an add to make sure they had 8 FBS football teams to be a real conference)
So the Pac-12 will be a real conference at about the level of the Big East-ish, as long as teams continue competing (and the WCC and MW will be torpedoed, but them's the breaks).
- Oregon State (bad now, but made E8 in 2021)
- Washington State (7 seed 2 years ago, S16 in 2008)
- Gonzaga (like I said, 27 straight tournaments)
- San Diego State (made 7 of last 8 tournaments and finals in 2023)
- Utah State (made 7 of last 8 tournaments)
- Colorado State (made 3 of last 4 tournaments with Niko Medved coaching)
- Boise State (made 3 of last 4 tournaments)
- Fresno State (made tournament in 2016, won CIT in 2023)
- Texas State (basically an add to make sure they had 8 FBS football teams to be a real conference)
So the Pac-12 will be a real conference at about the level of the Big East-ish, as long as teams continue competing (and the WCC and MW will be torpedoed, but them's the breaks).
Noblesville Illini
- Nappanee, IN
So glad the committee has finally been snakebit the last few years with the Zags. Don’t get me wrong, i love Few. He’s great, but the inflated seeds all those years in the tournament resulting in less than expected finishes finally caught up to them. Michigan IMHO is kinda tied to that now. Paper Tiger wins resulting in high ranking is only going to follow suit for them in the tournament as well. Michigan could win it all but they’ll have to prove a lot more than what we’ve seen so far., which is beating up on lesser competitors and not beating top 15 opponents sans Zags.
I think it has at least something to do with your record. They finished the reg season with 8 Ls last season. If the Michigan loss remains their lone blemish on Selection Sunday, can’t imagine them not getting a 1 or 2 seed.
Gonzaga has failed to play to their seed line 3 times in the last 15 tournaments.
lstewart53x3
- Scottsdale, Arizona
It’ll be very interesting to see how Gonzaga is seeded this year.
Last year, they played a much tougher schedule. They ended the season with 10 Q1 games, along with 8 Q2 games (18 total). Their record in those games wasn’t great (4-6 Q1 & 6-2 Q2, 10-8 combined).
This year, they’ve played just 4 Q1 games so far (3-1), along with 5 Q2 games (5-0). They have only 3 Q1 games remaining and zero Q2. So outside of their conference tournament, they’re currently on pace to play 6 fewer Q1/Q2 games than last year (12 vs 18).
Compare that to us, we’ve played 11 Q1/Q2 games so far (compared to their 9) and while they have just 3 such games remaining, we have 9 remaining.
So they’ll play 12 Q1/2 games pre-conference tourney and we will have played 20.
There were only a couple of NCAA tournament teams last year that played less than 18 Q1/2 games last year (7 seed St Mary’s with 15 and 11 seed VCU with 13).
So Gonzaga would have an incredibly light schedule for a one or two seed.
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