Bald Prophet Bracket Projection Update: Orange Win a Classic and a Streak Ends

After getting a late start to the day (but if you're a college hoops fan, you surely understand) there was a good deal of movement in today's bracket projection.  Obviously, the Orange helped themselves following a win for the ages. 

Other teams that helped their case before the committee include Michigan, Minnesota, San Diego State, and Boston College.

The last four teams in as of today are St. Mary's (more on them in a moment), UAB (an explanation is also to follow), Creighton and South Carolina.

St. Mary's finds themselves back in, thanks to the Lobos of New Mexico, who lost to sixth-seed Wyoming and found their RPI dropping to NIT levels.

UAB will raise some eyebrows, but a close inspection of their profile doesn't reveal a single bad (read, sub-100 RPI) loss and if they can beat Tulsa today they will find themselves in the Conference USA finals.

The last four teams out are Arizona (which needed to beat Arizona State to stay in but now sees their 24-year streak of tournament apperances end), Florida (which could sneak in if they can win tonight and UAB or South Carolina lose), Temple (has a better profile than people think) and UNLV (sorry guys, but getting blown out on your home floor was a realization of a worst-case scenario).

Bracket Projection (teams who have clinched are in bold)

East Region

1 Pitt v 16 Radford

2 Duke v 15 Morgan State

3 Kansas v 14 Portland State

4 Florida State v 13 Cleveland State

5 UCLA v 12 VCU

6 BYU v 11 Creighton

7 Tennessee v 10 Wisconsin

8 Ohio State v 9 Texas A&M

South Region

1 UNC v 16 Morehead State

2 Oklahoma v 15 East Tennessee State

3 Villanova v 14 Buffalo

4 Xavier v 13 Northern Iowa

5 West Virginia v 12 St. Mary’s

6 Purdue v 11 South Carolina

7 Arizona State v 10 Boston College

8 Butler v 9 Texas

 

Midwest Region

1 Louisville v 16 Play-In (Chattanooga v Alabama St.)

2 Michigan State v 15 Cornell

3 Wake Forest v 14 Binghamton

4 Missouri v 13 American

5 Gonzaga v 12 UAB

6 Utah v 11 California

7 Marquette v 10 Utah State

8 LSU v 9 Minnesota

 

West Region

1 Memphis v 16 CS-Northridge

2 UConn v 15 Robert Morris

3 Washington v 14 North Dakota State

4 Syracuse v 13 Stephen F. Austin

5 Illinois v 12 Western Kentucky

6 Oklahoma State v 11 Michigan

7 Clemson v 10 San Diego State

8 Dayton v 9 Siena