Bracketology - Jan 17 edition

[BRS24]

Women's Bracketology: Will Stanford miss NCAA tournament for first time since 1987?

The Cardinal are the

www.espn.com

No changes to the top 16 from the Tuesday post. Here's a look at the bubble:

 

[Plebe]

His comments on the bubble for this latest update are interesting:

"The most difficult aspect of putting the bracket together isn't determining the No. 1 seeds or the top 16. It's figuring out teams 71 through 76. The pool of NCAA tournament-worthy teams isn't deep. The group listed under Next Four Out each projection typically consists of teams that are a solid win away from the field or knocking on the door. Not this season. Those teams aren't particularly close to making the field despite mathematically being only five spots away. The bubble is that weak. ..."

Teams 71-76 per this graphic are George Mason, Clemson, Columbia, Seton Hall, Fairfield, and Colorado. Stated another way, he sees Stanford and St. Joseph's as the only "first four out" teams in serious contention for a bid.

 

[Bigboote]

"The most difficult aspect of putting the bracket together isn't determining the No. 1 seeds or the top 16. It's figuring out teams 71 through 76. The pool of NCAA tournament-worthy teams isn't deep. The group listed under Next Four Out each projection typically consists of teams that are a solid win away from the field or knocking on the door. Not this season. Those teams aren't particularly close to making the field despite mathematically being only five spots away. The bubble is that weak. ..."

The plethora of teams that just aren't that good (or the paucity of teams that are good) may be why I'm not enjoying watching as many games this years as in the past several. Also a lot of the good teams play a style that's just not that fun to watch, so it's not all on the crappy teams.

 

[Bone Dog]

Colorado? Yikes!

 

[packwrap]

Talent all at the top of the heap. Best group of 7 good schools ever. Probably best top 16 too.

This makes for great 'big games', and for an excellent sweet 16.

It's leaving little talent, however, for mid majors and the bottom of the conference.

Only non power schools with top 100 recruits for next yr are Harvard, Villanova and Creighton

 

[mudcat]

Talent all at the top of the heap. Best group of 7 good schools ever. Probably best top 16 too.

This makes for great 'big games', and for an excellent sweet 16.

It's leaving little talent, however, for mid majors and the bottom of the conference.

Only non power schools with top 100 recruits for next yr are Harvard, Villanova and Creighton

Creighton has 3 of them, will be interesting to see what Flanery can get out of them.

 

[Plebe]

The plethora of teams that just aren't that good (or the paucity of teams that are good) may be why I'm not enjoying watching as many games this years as in the past several. Also a lot of the good teams play a style that's just not that fun to watch, so it's not all on the crappy teams.

A glimpse at the teams ranked in the 40-60 range of the NET certainly corroborates the extraordinary weakness of the bubble teams.

 

[WiseWillie]

The plethora of teams that just aren't that good (or the paucity of teams that are good) may be why I'm not enjoying watching as many games this years as in the past several. Also a lot of the good teams play a style that's just not that fun to watch, so it's not all on the crappy teams.

I thought it was just me but for some reason and certainly a lot of what you stated could have bearing, watching games lately have not been especially captivating as in years past. Is it the sameness style of play that is now almost universal? Other? Interesting. What do others think?

 

[Bone Dog]

I thought it was just me but for some reason and certainly a lot of what you stated could have bearing, watching games lately have not been especially captivating as in years past. Is it the sameness style of play that is now almost universal? Other? Interesting. What do others think?

I feel it too.

 

[Jonathan14]

I thought it was just me but for some reason and certainly a lot of what you stated could have bearing, watching games lately have not been especially captivating as in years past. Is it the sameness style of play that is now almost universal? Other? Interesting. What do others think?

Could it be related to the concentration of talent at the top due to the ease of transfer through the portal?

Taking the Big East as an example, previously competitive teams lost some of their better players to the portal (e.g., Villanova: Olsen to Iowa, Dalce to MD; Marquette: Karlen to ND, Hare to Iowa State), so the top teams get stronger, and the teams that had been just outside the top 25 get weaker. (Though I'll admit neither Iowa nor Iowa State is looking particularly strong right now...but Villanova and Marquette are comparatively weaker than last season.)

 

[Bigboote]

Could it be related to the concentration of talent at the top due to the ease of transfer through the portal?

I absolutely lay some of the blame on the portal. Not so much concentration of talent at the top as lack of continuity on teams. Yes, I'd rather watch Karlen at Iowa than at Notre Dame, but at the same time I think teams consisting of half portal transfers leads to more one-on-one ball at the expense of crisp passing and coherent defense. I was bemoaning the lack of cohesion on Maryland a few days ago when it was pointed out that they're incorporating something like 7 transfers, so were still finding their way. They may find their way by mid-March, but then they'll spend most of next year incorporating another half-dozen transfers.

 

[fomalhaut]

I thought it was just me but for some reason and certainly a lot of what you stated could have bearing, watching games lately have not been especially captivating as in years past. Is it the sameness style of play that is now almost universal? Other? Interesting. What do others think?

Artistic play has largely given way to overtly physical play.

 

[packwrap]

Artistic play has largely given way to overtly physical play.

Hasn't it always been this way? UConn, ND, Stanford and the recent Oregon and Iowa teams gave you artistic play, and everyone else played physical...Baylor, Rutgers, Tenn, TX, Miss St and SC included.

 

[HuskyNan]

Hasn't it always been this way? UConn, ND, Stanford and the recent Oregon and Iowa teams gave you artistic play, and everyone else played physical...Baylor, Rutgers, Tenn, TX, Miss St and SC included.

In the old Big East, Rutgers, Louisville, Syracuse, and, yes, UConn would play very physical games. It took a little while for other teams to get the size and talent to play that style but it is nothing new.

 

[Rowdy831]

How many teams really have any shot at winning the NC this year in WCBB? To me you have two dynamics. First the top teams seem to get all the best players, and secondly the drop off after the top 15 or so players is quite substancial. Outside of foreign players does UConn even have a player that was lower than 15 in their class? Most teams don't have one player in the group so they have no way of competing.

The wild card for the future is how much money plays into getting top players. You have a few schools who could pay ten times what an average school could for players and what happens to parity when and if that happens. Until then it will be the same 4-5 schools every year fighting for the crown.

 

[Ozimoto]

During South Carolina's beatdown of Oklahoma yesterday it was mentioned that one of the keys to the Gamecock's success was the ability of Dawn Staley to keep her core players together for four years that leads to a continuity and coherence of play because the players all know each other and stick together. That has been a strength of UConn as well.

 

[Jonathan14]

How many teams really have any shot at winning the NC this year in WCBB? To me you have two dynamics. First the top teams seem to get all the best players, and secondly the drop off after the top 15 or so players is quite substancial. Outside of foreign players does UConn even have a player that was lower than 15 in their class? Most teams don't have one player in the group so they have no way of competing.

Coincidentally, my husband and I were talking about player rankings yesterday after the UConn vs. Seton Hall game and did some Googling to see what some of UConn's less-heralded players were ranked coming out of high school.

Aubrey Griffin was 33 in the Class of 2019. Kaitlyn Chen was 66 in 2020, the same year Paige was 1 (not a bad class, by the way, with Angel Reese at 2, Cam Brink at 3, Caitlin Clark at 4, and Kamilla Cardoso at 5). Qadence Samuels was 41 in the Class of 2023. To your point, every other UConn player who attended high school in the U.S. was ranked within the top 15 of their class.

My guess is that South Carolina, Notre Dame, etc., have a very similar composition.