The FIRST BUFFETOLOGY of March + the Waiting Line...

1	Kentucky	1	Auto
	Syracuse	2	Auto
	Duke	3	Auto
	Kansas	4	Auto
2	North Carolina	5	At-Large
	Michigan State	6	Auto
	Missouri	7	At-Large
	Ohio State	8	At-Large
3	Marquette	9	At-large
	Baylor	10	At-large
	Georgetown	11	At-large
	Michigan	12	At-large
4	Wisconsin	13	At-large
	Wichita St	14	Auto
	Indiana	15	At-large
	Murray St	16	Auto
5	Florida	17	At-large
	Temple	18	Auto
	Vanderbilt	19	At-large
	Louisville	20	At-large
6	Florida St	21	At-large
	Notre Dame	22	At-large
	New Mexico	23	At-large
	Gonzaga	24	At-large
7	UNLV	25	At-large
	Creighton	26	At-large
	St. Mary's	27	Auto
	San Diego St	28	Auto
8	Purdue	29	At-large
	Memphis	30	Auto
	Kansas St	31	At-large
	Virginia	32	At-large
9	Alabama	33	At-large
	St. Louis	34	At-large
	Iowa St	35	At-large
	Southern Miss	36	At-large
10	Harvard	37	Auto
	California	38	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Connecticut	39	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	West Virginia	40	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
11	BYU	41	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Seton Hall	42	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Cincinnati	43	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	South Florida	44	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
12	Colorado State	45	At-large	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Long Beach	46	Auto
	Mississippi St	47	At-large/Play-in	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Texas	48	At-large/Play-in	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Washington	49	Auto	Stuck in the Waiting Line
13	Arizona	50	At-large/Play-in	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	VCU	51	At-large/Play-in	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Davidson	62	Auto
	Akron	63	Auto
	Nevada	64	Auto
14	Iona	65	Auto
	Drexel	66	Auto
	Belmont	74	Auto
	Bucknell	75	Auto
15	Oral Roberts	76	Auto
	Middle Tenn St	77	Auto
	Montana	78	Auto
	Valparaiso	79	Auto
16	Long Island	80	Auto
	UT Alrington	81	Auto
	Stony Brook	82	Auto/Play-in
	UNC Asheville	83	Auto/Play-in
	Mississippi Valley St	84	Auto/Play-in
	Savannah St	85	Auto/Play-in
Last Four Out:	Miami FL	52	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Northwestern	53	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Xavier	54	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Oregon	55	Stuck in the Waiting Line
Next Four Out:	Colorado	56	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	St. Joseph's	57	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Dayton	58	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	UCF	59	Stuck in the Waiting Line
Last 9 consider	Illinois	60	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	New Mexico St	61	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	NC State	67	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	George Mason	68	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Tennessee	69	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Iowa	70	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Ohio	71	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	Wyoming	72	Stuck in the Waiting Line
	LSU	73	Stuck in the Waiting Line

In the Waiting Line...

March 1, 2012

Georgia (109) @ Kentucky (1): Kentucky is, was and will be #1 seed. The battle, albeit somewhat irrelevant, will be between UK and Syracuse for the top overall seed, and between the committee members themselves to figure out how to get the two teams on opposite sides of the bracket

Michigan (17) @ Illinois (75): Michigan tried to finish undefeated at Crisler. Purdue ruined that. Also ruined was a path to the regular season Big 10 title, with a little help (ironically) from Ohio State on Saturday. Instead, Michigan has a pretty phenomenal season developing, and a 3 seed to protect. Losing at Illinois wouldn't harm it, but now we'd talking about a 2 game losing streak in late Feb/early March, and forget about committee's, you just don't want that. However, short of losing to Penn State, in addition to losing this one and their first Big 10 game. Michigan should be squarely on the 3/4 line - pending some serious tournament mayhem. Those 5/6 teams just don't really profile the same way Michigan does.

Now, here's the flip side. Illinois DESPERATELY needs this. They've got a decent profile, if they hadn't shut it down come February 1st, during a prolonged losing streak where they showed zero ability to beat good teams, and, if you lose by 27 to Nebraska, it is really hard to convince the Buffet you are a tournament worthy team. The thing about now in a team's schedule is this, wins can make us "experts" reactionary - and Michigan and Wisconsin wouldn't just be wins, they would be high profile wins ... so Illinois isn't some long shot hoping for mercy, but they have to actually put results in the box scores.

Florida St. (28) @ Virginia (39): Someone please explain Florida St to us. A 6 seed today, they finished a 7 game win streak that included wins over UNC & at Duke with a loss at lowly Boston College. Then a quick 3 game run off was followed by 2 losses, one to a suspension shocked Miami FL team. They are difficult to understand. So we won't try. We'll let Virginia understand them. Florida is a lock, but losses like BC and a center-less Miami team will push them further down towards the 8/9, a road win tonight will get them back in the 5/6 orbit that they seemed to be nearing during their hot streak. A lack of any real non-conference work limits just how high of a seed they can get.

Tony Bennett has done an excllent job - and wins over Michigan, @Oregon and over CAA leader Drexel are carrying. The problem is UVA has been average at best in the ACC, and the ACC itself has been sort of pedestrian. Barring an ACC tournament run to the final, the rightful place for UVA will likely be in this 7-9 range, with a ceiling of a 6 and a floor of a 10.

Colorado (76) @ Oregon (48): a quintessential bubble elimination game - Tad Boyle has worked some magic at Colorado this year, with the Buffs holding an outside shot at the Pac12 regular season title (Wash would have to get swept in LA), but more importantly, developing a dangerous team heading to Staples. Colorado's profile looks empty before January, and that's the problem. When you are boasting Georgia as your signature NC win, why are you talking? It's hard to see a path to at-large, especially when the P12 seems like a 1/2-bid league half the time - because they'd have really only a shot one more good win (California) before the final. and 2 more wins, just might not be enough. Win out until the final - heck, win the final, stop leaving it up to people.

Oregon is in a similar spot,they played a weaker schedule, have less top wins, but less bad losses. Similar situation here - so this truly will be an elimination game.

Washington (49) @ Southern California (257): Washington is the current conference leader, but there's nothing secure about their position - an 12 seed in the latest Buffetology (and 13 in some prominent online places), they would actually be the play-in game opponent for Texas if they were not the current conference standings leader, and there for, for bracketing purposes, awarded the P12 auto bid. If they do anything less than sweep in LA - this resume light team will be on the outside looking in. They just didn't do a thing non-conference, and that's a problem.

New Mexico St (68) @ Nevada (56): New Mexico State makes its debut in the Waiting Line... this week, the road win at New Mexico carrying weight in a season when no one wants big wins. NMSU really isn't going to get in, unless other teams collapse against weak opponents. As #2 in WAC, they won't see Nevada after tonight until the WAC Final, and that's just not going to be competitive with big conference teams with profile building matchups every day and smaller conference teams like VCU & St. Joe's, who already have better wins going for them. It's not over, and a win tonight would be two nice road wins this season, but sadly, it just doesn't seem like enough.

Nevada is an interesting case, 3 top 100 wins, 2 on the road, without the albatross thatis their loss at home to Idaho, we'd be thinking at large a lot more seriously. NM St is likewise the only WAC profile building win for Nevada, and currently the Pack are at the bottom of the bunched up autobids on line 13. The problem is they need to only win, so get tonight's and then roll to the finals, pray NMSU is there waiting for them, and then they COULD be ok win or lose.