Notes:

• I am still weighting Pomeroy data pretty heavily; as I mentioned last week, that lends both an evaluative aspect and a predictive aspect to the proceedings. As mentioned, I will phase him out to a degree as we approach Selection Sunday.
• Ohio State's loss means three of the four 1-seeds are virtually automatic right now -- Kentucky, Syracuse and Missouri. Honestly, Kentucky and Syracuse would probably still be easy 1's with another loss. Missouri is treading quite a bit closer to the edge.
  
• Kansas gets the fourth No. 1 seed over Duke, Ohio State, Michigan State and North Carolina right now. That's a pretty easy call for me right now. Yes, Kansas has lost five times, but two of the losses were to fellow No. 1's away from home, and their loss to Duke is countered by their win over (an admittedly Jared Sullinger-less) Ohio State.
• Speaking of Kansas ... you were looking for a KU-KSU preview for tonight, right? Good! (And since I'm getting this up so late, consider this your KU-KSU live thread, I guess.)
  

Who's overrated?

Cincinnati (17-8) - SBN bracketologist Chris Dobbertean had Cincy a 10-seed this morning, but right now they're not even at the top of my "out" list. They're one of those weird teams with a couple of nice wins (Notre Dame, @UConn) blanketing the fact that the rest of their resume is pretty terrible. They rank 92nd in RPI, and they have home losses to St. John's, Marshall and Presbyterian. Oh and they've lost four of six. The good news, however, is that they finish the regular season with five consecutive Top 100 (according to Pomeroy) teams (Seton Hall, Louisville, @USF, Marquette, @Villanova). Perform well down the stretch, and you're in; play poorly, and you might not even be on the bubble anymore.

San Diego State (18-4) - They have four losses, and they are ranked in the RPI Top 25. Good things. Not as good: they are 56th in Pomeroy's ratings, and their win over Long Beach State probably qualifies among their top five wins. They barely escaped a dreadful USC team, they barely beat Boise State at home last week, they beat lowly Chicago State by just eight points ... their resume shows us all of the ways that a points-and-possessions system like Pomeroy tells us infinitely more than "who did they play, and what is their win percentage?" (a la RPI). Jerry Palm had them a 3-seed on Friday, and I kind of had to talk myself into giving them a 6 instead of a 7.

Colorado State (14-8) - They're 15-8, 4-4 in the Mountain West, their second-best win was over Colorado, they've lost four of six ... but Palm still had them in the field on Friday thanks to their strange No. 30 RPI ranking, and both Dobbertean and Joe Lunardi have them on the bubble. They're nowhere close to mine.

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It's that time of year again. From here until Selection Sunday, I will be offering weekly Rock-M-Tology updates each Monday(ish). Some notes as we get started:

• When drawing up a bracket this far out, there are so many different approaches you can take. Are you in some way predicting results the rest of the way? Are you taking purely an "if the tournament started today" approach? What I basically did with this one is take the later approach, only with heavy weight on teams' Pomeroy rankings, which a) the committee doesn't take into account at all and b) have a little bit of a predictive element to them. They are much more predictive than RPI, anyway. So in a way, I guess I split the difference. A team like Murray State only gets a 7-seed in the bracket below, even though they might be a bit higher if the tournament started today (last week's Jerry Palm bracket had them at a 3-seed, today's Chris Dobbertean bracket has them a 4.
• The other thing I tend to do this early is make this more of a "what would I do if I were the committee?" activity. As we approach Selection Sunday, I will shift more toward my prediction of what the committee will do.
• Generally speaking, the bracket below takes into account the following factors: non-conference performance, conference performance, road/neutral court wins, wins over the RPI Top 50, losses to teams ranked 101st or worse in the RPI, and Ken Pomeroy rank. I basically approach this from a numbers perspective first, then make manual adjustments from there. I like using numbers as a starting point because, if nothing else, I haven't seen full games from all of these teams yet. The numbers set the overall perspective for you. But this is by no means ALL numbers. Not even close.
• Yes, I have Missouri getting the final 1-seed right now. Mizzou, Baylor (No. 2 RPI) and Kansas (No. 3 Pomeroy) are locked tightly together, but since Mizzou is 2-0 versus those teams at the moment, they get the nod.

Alright, let's start with some overrated and underrated teams ... i.e. the teams about which I disagree most severely with some other bracketologists, namely Jerry Palm, Joe Lunardi and SBN's awesome Chris Dobbertean.

Who's overrated?

Colorado State (14-7) - Jerry Palm listed the Rams as a 13-seed last week, and Dobbertean had them an 11-seed this morning. Can't co-sign. Pomeroy has them ranked 102nd right now, and their five best wins are against San Diego State (a legitimately solid, 17-point win at home), Colorado, Denver, Manhattan and Montana. They have played seven games against likely NCAA tournament teams and lost six. They lost to Southern Miss by 21, Duke by 23, Wyoming by 19, New Mexico by 33 and UNLV by 19. Plus, they needed overtime to beat Manhattan, beat UTEP by just three, and needed two overtimes to beat lowly TCU at home. That's not a tournament team to me.

Mississippi State (18-5) - They're 18-5 and 5-3 in the SEC, so they're almost certainly a tourney team at the moment. But I don't think they've earned the six-seed given to them by Dobbertean and Lunardi. Against Pomeroy Top 100 teams, they are 5-4, and they have lost to to Ole Miss, Arkansas and Akron. They have beaten Alabama, Vanderbilt, West Virginia and Arizona, and they are obviously a tourney team, but I have them more in the 8-10 range.

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It's the first year of the 68-team field, and we quite possibly might have just nine conferences with multiple tourney bids.  Maybe the West Coast Conference gets a second ... but that's about it.  Probably not what the NCAA had in mind when they added three extra bids.

OR ... it was exactly what they had in mind.

A couple of months ago, I started these Rock-M-tology pieces by drawing up what I would do if I were the NCAA Committee ... what you see below is 100% what I think the committee will do.

Last 8 In

Illinois (19-13) - The Illini are 6-10 in their last 16 games, dropping them from "13-3 and possible Top Four Seed" to Last 8 In.  But they're almost certainly still in thanks to the wins.  They knocked off North Carolina on November 30, back when it was much easier to do so, but it still counts.  Throw in wins over Wisconsin and three bubble teams (Penn State, Michigan State, Michigan), and I think they're safe.  How are they ranked so high in Pomeroy's rankings, by the way?  They are 2-8 in games decided by five points or less or in overtime.  Pomeroy's rankings see a team that was very, very close to something like a 24-8 record and solid seed ... and they could be a team with solid first round upset potential, assuming they actually make the field.

Colorado (20-13) - We've all considered the Buffs safe since they beat Kansas State for a third time, but ... their peripherals still really aren't that strong.  RPI: 65th.  Pomeroy rank (which the committee obviously does not take into account): 49th.  In the end, their good wins (Texas, K-State x3, Mizzou) will likely get them in, though the fact that they lost to two other bubble teams (Harvard by 16, Georgia by 9, both on the road) and lost to San Francisco, Oklahoma and Iowa State to boot, still keeps them in the Last 8 In.

Virginia Tech (21-11) - Every time I think the Hokies are safe, they do something to almost change my mind.  Their ACC tourney showing, in which they beat Florida State, likely keeps them on the right side of the bubble for once, but their 4-8 record against teams either in the tourney or on the First 7 Out list makes it shaky.  (Their two losses to Virginia and 15-point loss at terrible Georgia Tech doesn't help either.)  They beat Duke, knocked off Florida State twice and handled bubble team Penn State by 10 points ... but they're still not entirely safe, are they?

Georgia (21-11) - RPI: 48th.  Pomeroy rank: 57th.  Best wins according to RPI: Kentucky and ... UAB.  Lost to bubble team Alabama twice.  Georgia will be a very interesting test case in terms of teams that have few great wins and no terrible losses versus teams that have plenty of both (i.e. USC).  If, earlier in the bracket, we see Mizzou (another team with little greatness and no terrible losses) end up with 10- or 11-seed, then Georgia's screwed.  I like to reward teams for taking care of business against lesser teams, and UGa certainly did that ... but if they're out, they can blame that whole "3-11 versus potential tourney teams" thing.

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Alright, now that that pesky "Having to watch Mizzou play" thing is out of the way, it's time to focus on the rest of the country.  Lots and lots of interesting basketball today (and plenty of uninteresting ball too)...including three early-day "play-in" games of sorts.  Among other things, the winners of Bama-UGa, Illinois-Michigan and BC-Clemson are almost definitely in the field (the losers might be too, but the winners almost assuredly are).  And of course, oddly-placed-as-always Patriot League finals tip off in the late-afternoon...

11:00 AM CT

No. 1 Ohio State vs Northwestern (Big Ten Quarterfinals, ESPN)
No. 7 North Carolina vs Miami (ACC Quarterfinals, ESPN2)
No. 20 Xavier vs Dayton (Atlantic 10 Quarterfinals)

12:00 PM CT

Alabama vs Georgia (SEC Quarterfinals, ESPN3)

1:00 PM CT

Illinois vs Michigan (Big Ten Quarterfinals, ESPN)
Boston College vs Clemson (ACC Quarterfinals, ESPN2)

1:30 PM CT

St. Joseph's vs Duquesne (Atlantic 10 Quarterfinals)

2:00 PM CT

UTEP vs Tulsa (Conference USA Semis)

2:30 PM CT

No. 16 Kentucky vs Ole Miss (SEC Quarterfinals, ESPN3)

3:45 PM CT

Bucknell vs Lafayette (Patriot League Finals, ESPN2)

After the jump: ROCK-M-TOLOGY!

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Notes as we head into the first week of the two-week CHAMPIONSHIP WEEK!!!

• Marquette has Cincy at home and Seton Hall on the road this week.  Unless they go 1-2 in these games and their first Big East Tournament game, it's all but certain that we're getting 11 Big East teams in the field.  And even 1-2 might get them in.  Their road win over UConn this week all but punched their ticket.
  
  It's interesting -- I don't think this is the best the 16-team Big East has ever been, but the number of bids isn't about simple quality ... it's about balance.  If you are too top heavy, then teams in the middle are going to possibly have too many losses to sneak in the field (see: Big 12).  But if everybody in the top half loses to each other and nobody really runs away with the title (see: Big East, SEC), you can probably sneak more teams in.  I don't think it's much of a competition about which conference is better -- Big 12 or SEC -- but right now the SEC has six teams in the field.  The only way the Big 12 is getting six is if either Nebraska or Colorado catch fire or somebody unexpected wins the conference tourney.
• I know, I know ... we're saying this at the end of February every year ... but man oh MAN is the bubble weak.  I'm looking forward to a couple of surprise tourney champions eating up a couple of at-large bids because I could barely differentiate from the last three or four names on the "In" list and the 10-12 on the "Out" list.  Gonzaga vs VCU ... Memphis vs Nebraska ... Minnesota vs Michigan ... Boston College vs Wichita State ... really difficult to figure out who's deserving and who isn't.
• Once again I ask ... what's the difference between 68 and 96 teams?  With 68, we're drawing the "in or out" line between 17-11 Boston College and 17-11 Minnesota.  With 96, it's 18-10 Arkansas and 18-12 Northern Iowa.  Once you get past 60 teams, there are about 50 teams with all-too-similar resumes.

Here are the teams who either made their way into the field in the last week or found themselves to the door.

In

Missouri State (23-7) - SMS took the Missouri Valley crown, so they hold the symbolic automatic bid until the conference tourney kicks up this weekend.

Memphis (21-8) - I still have no idea how they're in my Field of 68.

Actually, you know what?  Screw it.  They're out.  They just lost at UTEP by 27 points.  I can't make myself do it, even though Palm and Lunardi both had them in heading into the weekend.  And you know who's in instead?  Michigan.

Michigan (18-12) - They're really not on Lunardi's or Palm's radar at the moment, but in the last two weeks, they've won two Big Ten road games (one against fellow bubble member Minnesota), and they've lost to tourney teams Illinois and Wisconsin by a combined three points.  They don't appear to have much support from pundits right now, but ... screw it.  I like their resume better than Memphis'.  At least they only lost to UTEP by nine...

Richmond (22-7) - All the Spiders did was take out a bad Charlotte team this week, but by simply not shooting themselves in the foot this week, they moved up.

Gonzaga (20-9) - A week ago, I was scoffing at the notion of the Zags still having a shot at an at-large bid.  Then other teams fell apart while Gonzaga won at St. Mary's (who is also falling apart).  Their No. 65 RPI is putrid, but they're No. 37 in Pomeroy, and ... again, nobody else really deserves it any more than they do.

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As I make the shift from "What I would do" to "What I think the committee would do," here are a few notes from the last week or so of basketball.

• There are basically five top teams, followed by two Mountain West teams, followed by everybody else.  The top five teams (Duke, Kansas, Ohio State, Pittsburgh, Texas) were so close together that I bumped Duke all the way from fifth overall to first after the top four teams all lost.  The five teams stayed the same, but the order changed.  I'm really curious what BYU or San Diego State would have to do to get a 1-seed at this point -- really, I think it would take multiple losses by at least two of that top five.  Those five, in some order, are pretty entrenched at this point.
  
• One of the annoying parts of putting together these brackets before the conference tourneys is figuring out automatic bids.  Do you go with the team that ranks the highest on the list?  Do you just go with conference leaders?  Right now UTEP is atop the Conference USA standings, but I have both UAB and Memphis ranking above them overall (and Southern Miss gaining ground).  Do I give them the auto bid?  I did this week, but I don't trust them to win the conference tourney.
• Alabama, meanwhile, is right on the bubble without the SEC's automatic bid ... but do they get the auto nod since they're tied with Florida in the standings?  I said no, but it's all very mushy until teams start winning (and losing) conference tournaments.
• The Big East still has 11 teams in the field.  Marquette lost to St. John's (then again, who hasn't recently?) but beat Seton Hall at home, and in a week where seemingly everybody lost a game, that was enough to keep them above water.  Amazingly, the other 10 bids are all quite solid.  The Big East is in position to benefit from a weak mid-major class more than anybody.
• This really was an interesting week.  Of the 68 teams in last week's field, 38 lost at least one game this week.  I marked 29 teams to fall and only 12 to rise.  Two of the four new teams in this week's field (Maryland and VCU) even lost a game this week ... meaning they rose into the field while going 1-1.
• Looking at others' brackets (and Friday's bracket "mock draft"), I think I'm putting less value on big wins than others.  I tend to value big wins and big losses with the same weight, but looking at how others have been seeding teams like St. John's and Tennessee (and how I've been putting them much lower) makes me think that I should probably be placing a bit more value on that.

Out

Let's take a look at the four teams who fell out of last week's bracket.

Colorado State (18-8) - The Rams really didn't have a bad week.  They took out TCU on the road with ease (69-55), but they failed to close out UNLV at home, losing by seven on Saturday.  That's not a bad win, but CSU's spot on the bubble was, to me, pretty precarious.  They get shots at BYU and San Diego State in coming weeks, so they can play themselves back in.  Especially if everybody else keeps losing.

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After Big Monday knocked me off-course last week, Rock-M-Tology is back!  Two developments I am noticing as we find ourselves deep into mid-February:

1) The Big East's bids are, strangely, solidifying.  Every year, we go through the same routine.  When conference play begins, the bracketologists (and armchair bracketologists) end up with something ridiculous like 12 Big East teams in their first bracket.  Then those teams beat each other up, and a few teams end up too far below .500 in conference to get a serious look at a bid.  I assumed the same thing would happen this year.  Instead ... just look at the Big East standings.  There are seven teams at either 7-5 or 6-6 in conference!  If the season ended today, the teams who receive the fifth through 11th seeds in the Big East tournament would be one game apart.  And right now, I have all 11 teams currently at 6-6 or better in the Field of 68.  I'd have figured the conference would be down to 8-9 in the field right now, but with St. John's solidifying their resume and Marquette holding on by the skin of their teeth, all 11 are still in.  Marquette really can't afford to slip any further, though.

2) This bubble is simply awful.  Question: would there really be any difference right now between a field of 68 and a field of 96?  My last two teams in the Field of 68 right now are, somehow, 15-9 Kansas State and 13-10 Michigan State.  (I know, I was as surprised as you.)  If there were a field of 96, the bubble would burst somewhere around 14-8 Central Florida, 17-9 Northern Iowa, 14-11 Providence and 13-12 USC.  Are those teams weaker than the ones currently in the bracket below?  Absolutely. But ... a lot weaker?  Not at all.

Anyway, Baylor and Oklahoma State are still teetering on the bubble (though I assume Baylor's improved form will get them in eventually), so the Big 12 still has only five teams in.  Which is good, really, because the bracket is already a mess having to account for 11 Big East rivals.

Who's overrated?

Tennessee (15-10) - For reasons that evade me, Jerry Palm still has the Vols as an 8-seed as of this morning.  Lunardi had them a seven as of Friday.  They rank 25th in RPI (which does suggest around a 7-seed), but they are 46th in Pomeroy's rankings, and they are just 5-5 in the SEC, having lost three in a row.  The exclusion of the "last ten games" measure from Palm's "Gory Details" sheet provided to the committee may help UT, which can hang their hat on handing Pittsburgh an early loss.  But ... yuck.  I certainly have them in the field, but among the Last Eight In.

St. John's (15-9) - A minor qualm here.  I think they are absolutely in now -- they are 4-1 in the last 15 days, with wins over Duke and UConn, and I don't even have them among my Last Eight In -- but Palm has them as a 6-seed this morning, which is ludicrous.  Losses still matter, and with the early-season blemishes against St. Bonaventure and Fordham, I'm pretty sure the Johnnies would have the worst pair of losses of anybody among the top 30-40 teams, much less the top 24 that constitute six-seeds.  I love this team, and I hate that I have them paired up with Mizzou below, but ... they're not a 6-seed.  If they keep winning against their ridiculous schedule (@Marquette, Pittsburgh this week), they might get there.  But they're nowhere close yet.

Kansas State (15-9) - Palm has them out as of this morning, so the course corrections may be taking shape correctly, but Lunardi still had them as a 10-seed as of Friday.  I have them in as the 67th team in the field, basically, and as we know from previous Championship Weeks, teams that close to the bubble before the tourney week upsets start, do not find themselves in the final Field of 68.

Marquette (15-10) - They're in, but ... an 8-seed, Lunardi?  Really?  They hadn't earned that even before their weekend loss to Georgetown.

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