COMMENTS FROM DAVID DORMAN (coming soon…):
-I believe 10 teams have separated themselves from the pack. My 1 and 2 seeds plus Houston and Nebraska. These teams are playing at a very high level but it’s early January so it will be interesting if I feel this way when we enter March.
Under the radar teams I strongly believe in at this time:
St. Louis
UNC-Wilmington
Murray State
Oakland
Yale
Miami (OH)
-A team I believe most are still sleeping on this year and I feel is for real is the Miami Hurricanes. Coach Lucas has completed turned this roster over and has the ‘Canes playing smart basketball on offense and tough defense. Look for this squad to spend the next two months working on their seed.
-A team I see in others brackets that is not close in my mind, the LSU Tiger. A soft non conference schedule led to a sweet win/loss record but I’m thinking the tough conference games will show us that these Tigers do not belong in the bracket.
-It’s conference time in college hoops, where we separate the contenders from the pretenders.
STAFF COMMENTS:
From Chad:
I don’t have Dorman’s notes yet so I am not sure how he is going to explain a few things, but I have pretty much no complaints at all about the entire top half of his bracket. After the 8 line, I see a few teams that I feel do not deserve to be in the field right now.
- Texas A&M: This team has only beaten two teams that I even believe belong in the discussion — a road win at Auburn (see below) and a home win over an LSU team that is right on the bubble. I can’t say choosing them was a mistake, but having them all the way up on the 8 line does not cut it for me.
- Auburn: The Tigers are only 9-6 and have no true road wins yet. A neutral court win over a St John’s team that is barely in the field right now is their only notable win away from home — and they don’t have much on their home resume either. I can see putting a 9-6 team in with the right resume, but this team is 3-6 against the top three tiers — that is a non-starter for me.
- UCLA: Even worse than A&M and Auburn, the Bruins have not beaten anyone in the at-large discussion. I just do not see it at all.
- VCU: I have to assume this is a typo and he meant Saint Louis. The Billikens slot in perfectly on the 9 line as the A-10 auto bid winner.
I am not saying that there are many great choices to replace his picks — but teams like LSU, Oklahoma State, Missouri and even Stanford have, in my opinion, better resumes at the moment.
From Stalica:
- I think Dorman got a team like Villanova correct; the win at Seton Hall is now a little offset with the home loss to Creighton. I wish I could have seen Dorman’s top 4 out to see how close Creighton is to his field.
- I’m starting to join the Griggs camp on Kentucky. Losing at Alabama was forgivable (especially if you’re a fan of the ELO Chess concept). Losing at home to Missouri is not forgivable. I don’t think the Tigers are quite in the field yet, but they took a giant leap forward.
- Would the Miami Redhawks be above or below his First Four? After a double-digit win at Toledo, there’s a great chance they’ll be a Top 25 team sooner or later. While their strength of schedule is atrocious, I also think it’s a byproduct of teams ducking Miami given the number of true road games scheduled in the noncon part of the schedule.
- The exclusion of USC, LSU and Saint Louis is eye opening here. While winning last night at Minnesota isn’t a quality win in and of itself, it’s more than teams like Indiana and Iowa managed.
- But upon further review, I do see one wrinkle that Dorman threw in the bracket – he has Dayton winning the A-10 as the autobid winner (seeing as how they’re in the First Four). Under this scenario, I can only assume that he had a Freudian slip and meant to put in Saint Louis instead of VCU. The Rams aren’t anywhere close to being safely in the field yet.
