This is the second 'Bubble Talk' I have done, doing one about a month or so ago. Since then plenty has changed so let's take a look at the updated bubble picture.
65 total bids are given out, 34 at-larges and 31 automatic bids. Here are the automatic bids that have already been given out:
Pennsylvania (Ivy)
Winthrop (Big South)
Virginia Commonwealth (Colonial)
Belmont (Atlantic Sun)
Eastern Kentucky (Ohio Valley)
Creighton (Missouri Valley)
Davidson (Southern Conference)
Now there are 24 more automatic bids to be given out. Here are the current top seeds left in each conference's tournament. If the #1 seed has already been knocked out, then whatever the highest seed left is what we will use for this as our 'automatic qualifier'. And they are (with the seed in parentheses)...
ACC: North Carolina (1)
Atlantic Ten: Xavier (1)
Big East: Georgetown (1)
Big Sky: Weber State (1)
Big 10: Ohio State (1)
Big 12: Kansas (1)
Big West: Long Beach State (1)
Conference USA: Memphis (1)
Horizon: Wright State (1)
MAAC: Niagara (2)
MAC: Toledo (1)
Mid-Continent: Oral Roberts Curse (1)
MEAC: Delaware State (1)
Mountain West: BYU (1)
NEC: Central Connecicut State (1)
Pac 10: UCLA (1)
Patriot: Holy Cross (1)
SEC: Florida (1)
Southland: Texas A&M Corpus Christi (1)
SWAC: Mississippi Valley State (1)
Sun Belt: Arkansas State (2)
West Coast: Gonzaga (1)
WAC: Nevada (1)
Well, listing the seeds was a waste of my time but it took an extra 2 seconds so it isn't a big deal. OK, with those teams out of consideration let's take a look at the teams that will make the NCAA Tournament (remember, I have 34 slots to play with assuming a team that is expected to make the Tournament or listed above wins the conference tournament).
Absolute Stone-Cold Locks:
- Wisconsin
- Texas A&M
- Texas
- Oregon
- Pittsburgh
- Louisville
- Duke
- Virginia
- Virginia Tech
- Southern Illinois
- Butler
- Kentucky
- Maryland
- Vanderbilt
- Oregon
- Indiana
- Tennessee
- Marquette
- Notre Dame
- Villanova
- USC
- Arizona
- UNLV
- Boston College
- Texas Tech
- Michigan State
- Stanford
- Air Force
- Syracuse
- Georgia Tech
- Old Dominion
- Illinois
- Missouri State
- Drexel
- Purdue
- Kansas State
- Alabama
- West Virginia
- Massachusetts
- Mississippi State
- DePaul
- Michigan
- Bradley
- Mississippi
Rock Chalk!