Knocking on the bubble
By Travis
The last six at-large bids in Joe Lunardi’s Bracketology at ESPN.com:
-UAB (19-8, 0-1 top 50, 4-3 top 100, 7-3 last 10, 68th RPI, 130th Strength of schedule)
-Arizona State (17-9, 4-5 top 50, 6-7 top 100, 3-7 L10, 70th RPI, 79th SOS)
-Davidson (20-6, 0-3 vs Top 50, 0-5 vs top 100, 10-0 L10, 61st in RPI, 158th SOS)
-Florida (20-7, 1-4 top 50, 3-6 top 100, 5-5 L10, 60th RPI, 115th SOS)
-New Mexico (22-6, 0-3 top 50, 5-4 top 100, 8-2 L10, 44th RPI, 149th SOS).
-Ohio State (17-10, 1-8 top 50, 3-8 top 100, 5-5 L10, 54th RPI, 40th SOS)
So, how do the Cats stack up?
-Kentucky (15-10, 3-5 top 50, 3-8 top 100, 8-2 L10, 65th RPI, 19th SOS)
I don’t think they should be in ahead of any of those teams RIGHT NOW — UAB and Florida beat them, plus Ohio State beat Florida — and it looks like the UAB loss might end up being a bigger loss than San Diego or Gardner-Webb.
Plus, there are several other teams on the outside looking in that would probably beat the Cats in the tournament, but UK has definitely entered bubble status. Not much separates them from serious argument any longer. The four teams just out of Lunardi’s brackets:
-Houston (20-6, 0-4 top 50, 2-6 top 100, 7-3 L10, 63rd RPI, 136th SOS)
-Rhode Island (20-8, 2-5 top 50, 4-6 top 100, 5-5 L10, 56th RPI, 99th SOS)
-Syracuse (17-11, 3-7 top 50, 5-10 top 100, 4-6 L10, 48th RPI, 7th SOS)
-Western Kentucky (20-6, 0-5 top 50, 0-5 top 100, 9-1 L10, 53rd RPI, 145th SOS)
That Houston loss looms just as big as the UAB loss.
The next four out of Lunardi’s projections:
-Dayton (17-9, 2-3 top 50, 7-6 top 100, 3-7 L10, 39th RPI, 26th SOS)
-Illinois State (19-8, 1-4 top 50, 6-6 top 100, 6-4 L10, 42nd RPI, 81st SOS)
-Southern Illinois (16-12, 3-5 top 50, 8-8 top 100, 7-3 L10, 49th RPI, 10th SOS)
-Villanova (17-9, 4-5 top 50, 7-7 top 100, 4-6 L10, 50th RPI, 55th SOS)
I’m confident 12 conference wins and at least one SEC Tournament victory would clinch a berth. Even 11 conference wins and two SEC Tourney wins should be enough. That would move the Cats up to the 40s in Ken Pomeroy’s RPI.
(Edit: Numbers and teams were edited after updates on Monday morning.)