I still think we have a snowballs chance if we only drop one game to Cinci or SMU to close out the season, and make it to the championship game in the conference tourney…but that’s expecting a lot. Even winning at Tulsa and at Memphis will be a test if we don’t play at the level we’ve played our last few games.
If we win 6 of 7 with the only loss coming at Cincy; we put ourselves in the conversation. RPI Forecast puts us in the 39-40 range if that happens. If Vermont & Rhode Island keep winning and make the tourney, that would give us 3 wins over tourney teams and only 2 bad losses (Harvard and Memphis). We may even get some sympathy for not having Davis for those games.
Doing that would put as the #3 seed in the AAC tourney most likely where we’d get a bye before playing the 6/11 winner. We’d have to win that before playing, probably, SMU again. Win that and we’d suddenly have a decent chance even with losing the final.
It’ll be tough; lot of potential land mines going forward.
Gonna go ahead an call 5-2 the rest of the way, but 3-4 is a not-too-far-fetched possibility as well. I’m feeling we can split with Tulsa/Memphis/SMU/Cincy the rest of the way, with the two losses coming more than likely against Tulsa and Cincy IMO. But a 2-2 split combined with the other three we should win probably gets us no worse than a No. 4 in the AAC tourney with a bye in the first round. After that, anything can happen. Would be nice to get a win or two to strengthen our case, but I’ve been saying all along this team is NIT-bound. And that would be about right, too. Not enough quality wins, especially when you consider the conference was a little down this year. I’ve always been of the opinion that you shoot for the tournament where you can make the most noise. I’m not sure they can make a ton of noise in the NIT, but an NCAA berth playing a 5-7 seed in the first round would be an all-too-difficult draw for them, Take the 20-plus wins and possibly a small handful of victories in the postseason and call it a good year.
The conference took it on the chin when UCONN couldn’t make it out of the gate. We needed them to prop up everyone’s RPI. Without them we’re all on our own. Luckily Cincy and SMU have come through but this conference needs 4 ranked schools to compete nationally.
