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Through games of February 25, conference games only
Pace: possessions per 40 minutes
PPP: points per possession
Opp. PPP: opponent points per possession
EM: efficiency margin (PPP - Opp. PPP)
ACC: Miami Will Test the RPI's Value this Year
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. North Carolina 75.6 1.12 0.97 +0.15
2. Duke 76.5 1.12 0.98 +0.14
3. Clemson 68.4 1.09 1.01 +0.08
4. Maryland 72.1 1.05 1.04 +0.01
5. Georgia Tech 72.6 1.06 1.07 -0.02
6. Wake Forest 72.4 1.02 1.04 -0.02
7. Miami 70.0 1.04 1.07 -0.03
8. BC 69.3 1.07 1.10 -0.03
9. Virginia Tech 72.8 0.96 1.01 -0.05
10. Florida St. 68.3 0.97 1.04 -0.07
11. Virginia 69.5 0.99 1.06 -0.07
12. NC State 67.8 0.99 1.13 -0.14
Having won back-to-back home games against Duke and Maryland in the past seven days, Miami is now ideally positioned to be the perfect RPI test case for 2008. Put simply, while the Hurricanes have a great RPI (23), they're just not a very good team. They've been outscored by 19 points over 12 games by an ACC that, to say the least, isn't terribly formidable this year. (Note also that Miami only had to play the conference's best team, North Carolina, once in those 12 games, and that game was in Miami.) Should an RPI-inflating road win at Mississippi State way back on December 13 really be enough to get this team into the dance at the expense of a plucky mid-major? I'll be open to persuasion if the 'Canes can win tomorrow night at Clemson.
Big 12: A Clear Top Three...and Then What?
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Kansas 69.1 1.14 0.93 +0.21
2. Kansas St. 70.3 1.11 0.99 +0.12
3. Texas 64.7 1.10 1.00 +0.10
4. Baylor 73.4 1.07 1.07 0.00
5. Texas Tech 69.2 1.01 1.02 -0.01
6. Texas A&M 62.7 1.02 1.04 -0.02
7. Oklahoma St. 65.3 1.00 1.02 -0.02
8. Missouri 70.8 1.02 1.08 -0.06
9. Nebraska 65.2 0.96 1.03 -0.07
10. Oklahoma 64.4 1.00 1.08 -0.08
11. Iowa St. 67.8 0.91 1.00 -0.09
12. Colorado 61.0 0.97 1.11 -0.14
If the season ended today, the Big 12 would be one tough knot for the selection committee to untangle. Let's start with the easy part. Kansas and Texas are Kansas and Texas. Kansas State is faltering at the moment, but the Wildcats have enough impressive performances in their recent past to merit a mid-range seed. After those three teams, though, it gets messy. Take Texas A&M. What do you make of a team that beat Texas by 17 but lost at home to Nebraska? Move to the head of the class if you replied: "Why, that team's wildly inconsistent, John!" In terms of game-to-game variation in conference play, the Big 12's most unstable and erratic entities are the Aggies' offense and the Longhorns' defense. Frankly, the variation in A&M's offense is a much bigger concern for Mark Turgeon than are the wild swings in D for Rick Barnes. At least Barnes has an excellent offense to fall back on. Turgeon, on the other hand, will be forgiven if, in late February, he's still unclear about which side of the ball he's supposed to rely on for his Ws.
Big East: Yes, We're Headed for Another Syracuse Controversy
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Louisville 67.1 1.07 0.90 +0.17
2. Georgetown 63.0 1.05 0.93 +0.12
3. Marquette 69.2 1.07 0.97 +0.10
4. West Virginia 64.2 1.05 0.97 +0.08
5. Notre Dame 73.3 1.09 1.03 +0.06
6. Connecticut 67.9 1.08 1.03 +0.05
7. Pitt 63.9 1.07 1.03 +0.04
8. Syracuse 69.7 1.02 1.02 0.00
9. Villanova 68.9 1.01 1.02 -0.01
10. Cincinnati 64.8 0.98 0.99 -0.01
11. DePaul 67.0 1.02 1.08 -0.06
12. Seton Hall 69.7 1.03 1.10 -0.07
13. Providence 67.2 1.02 1.09 -0.07
14. S. Florida 63.6 0.99 1.10 -0.11
15. St. John's 65.8 0.89 1.01 -0.12
16. Rutgers 67.0 0.87 1.06 -0.19
The Orangemen are again right on the borderline. Which will it be: a bid, or Jim Boeheim doing yet another round of aggrieved TV spots starting at 7 p.m. Eastern on Selection Sunday? At least this year the 'Cuse has the very good fortune of ending the year with a couple of home games against good teams. If Boeheim's young crew can win in the Carrier Dome against Pitt and, especially, Marquette, they'll have done as much as they can to make everyone forget their loss at South Florida on February 13. (Yes, Connecticut almost lost in Tampa as well. Duly noted.)
Big Ten: Now, Finally, We'll Find Out about Ohio State
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Wisconsin 60.9 1.07 0.92 +0.15
2. Indiana 64.6 1.09 0.98 +0.11
3. Purdue 64.7 1.05 0.95 +0.10
4. Michigan St. 64.0 1.05 0.96 +0.09
5. Ohio St. 63.8 1.01 0.92 +0.09
6. Minnesota 66.4 1.02 1.02 0.00
7. Illinois 62.5 0.99 1.00 -0.01
8. Michigan 63.8 0.97 1.05 -0.08
9. Iowa 59.6 0.92 1.00 -0.08
10. Penn St. 62.0 0.99 1.14 -0.15
11. Northwestern 62.1 0.95 1.18 -0.23
Indiana hosts the Big Ten's lone bubble team, Ohio State, tonight. The Buckeyes look surprisingly good on paper in part because Thad Matta's team has benefited from a back-loaded schedule. Now it's time to pay up. OSU has four games left, three of which will be against superior opponents: the Hoosiers, Purdue and Michigan State. Ohio State has been one of the best two-point shooting teams in the country the past couple months (among major-conference teams, only USC and Florida have posted higher 2FG percentages in-conference) and, as seen here, the Buckeyes' defense has been excellent. Only problem: as always in the Matta era, OSU is shooting a lot of threes, only this year they're not falling. That will need to change against the schedule Ohio State faces the rest of the way.
Pac-10: File Under "Extreme Statistical Oddity"
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. UCLA 65.1 1.13 0.95 +0.18
2. Stanford 62.8 1.06 0.94 +0.12
3. Washington St. 58.4 1.10 1.02 +0.08
4. USC 65.0 1.04 0.99 +0.05
5. Arizona 63.3 1.09 1.07 +0.02
6. Oregon 63.8 1.10 1.11 -0.01
7. Washington 67.8 0.99 1.01 -0.02
8. Arizona St. 62.5 0.99 1.02 -0.03
9. Cal 67.4 1.09 1.14 -0.05
10. Oregon St. 65.7 0.87 1.17 -0.30
Amaze your friends! Try this simple trick: rank every Pac-10 team "1" through "10" according to their performance in-conference. Ready? Now, as seen here, there's less difference between 1 and 9 than there is between 9 and 10. True story.
As to how many of those nine will get into the tournament, most brackets right now say six, though personally I'd be more comfortable drawing that line just below Arizona. Then again, Oregon will have every opportunity to burnish their tempo-free credentials, finishing the season with a road game at Oregon State and home games against Arizona State and Arizona. It's where you finish that matters, particularly in this conference, where everyone plays everyone home and away. Keep that in mind when I post the last one of these for the season: you can set your watch by the Pac-10's tempo-free stats. That doesn't mean tournament performance will match conference performance exactly. It does mean conference performance will tell you exactly how surprised you should be by the inevitable tournament surprises.
SEC: Any Three-Peat Will Have to Start with a Bid
Opp.
Pace PPP PPP EM
1. Tennessee 72.6 1.11 0.96 +0.15
2. Mississippi St. 67.0 1.03 0.94 +0.09
3. Arkansas 68.9 1.04 0.99 +0.05
4. Vanderbilt 68.0 1.05 1.02 +0.03
5. Florida 69.2 1.10 1.09 +0.01
6. Kentucky 63.2 1.02 1.02 0.00
7. Alabama 68.9 1.03 1.06 -0.03
8. Georgia 67.2 0.97 1.02 -0.05
9. Ole Miss 69.8 1.05 1.10 -0.05
10. South Carolina 64.5 1.04 1.11 -0.07
11. Auburn 68.6 1.07 1.14 -0.07
12. LSU 66.4 0.98 1.07 -0.09
As with the Pac-10, in the SEC we find a high-scoring team with no defense whatsoever currently in the mix for its conference's final bid. In the Pac-10, that team is Oregon. In the SEC, it's Florida. Big difference: two of the the Gators' final four regular season games are against the two best teams in the conference. In between road games at Georgia and Kentucky, Billy Donovan's young team will host Mississippi State and Tennessee. It's not too much to say that Florida's season will be defined by those two home games.
John Gasaway is an author of Basketball Prospectus.
You can contact John by clicking here or click here to see John's other articles.
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