aginlakeway said:

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Fquin said:

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I'm telling you, the sooner this board takes off its maroon glasses and we make peace with the fact the Aggies are a 4 seed at best and if things go terribly wrong possibly even a 5 seed. You will all sleep better. We still have to beat everybody in our bracket to get where we want. It's all about style matchups for A&M.

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I'll give you 50:1 odds that we're not a 5 seed.

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I doubt he even thinks there's actually a chance for a 5 seed. It's bait!

Looks like 3 conferences could be "bid thieves" at this point. I would consider Boise State (who might be in already) and Colorado State (forget BYU, they might be the hottest team in America other than Michigan State) as bid thieves. UC Irvine looks legit and could steal a bid as UC San Diego might be already in. And who knows what happens in the American. Bubble teams are not sleeping well tonight.

t - cam said:

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LouisvilleAg said:

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Fquin said:

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I'm telling you, the sooner this board takes off its maroon glasses and we make peace with the fact the Aggies are a 4 seed at best and if things go terribly wrong possibly even a 5 seed. You will all sleep better. We still have to beat everybody in our bracket to get where we want. It's all about style matchups for A&M.

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Disagree with this completely. There is one thing that differentiates us from everyone else around the 3, 4, and 5 seeds and that is our non conference schedule. Not only did we play a ridiculous schedule, we also had a pretty damn good record. And most of our losses came in the toughest league in the history of college basketball. I can understand a 4, but there is absolutely zero chance we get a 5.

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I just realize I hide Fquin. You quoting him reminds me that he's insanely annoying and wrong nearly all the time.

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This is comical coming from the likes of t-cam. If Colleyville Ag, Bobinator or Louisville Ag call me out like this it would mean something. But, they understand frustrated hyperbole. t-cam I still like you though.

ExtremeRush said:

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Fquin said:

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I'm telling you, the sooner this board takes off its maroon glasses and we make peace with the fact the Aggies are a 4 seed at best and if things go terribly wrong possibly even a 5 seed. You will all sleep better. We still have to beat everybody in our bracket to get where we want. It's all about style matchups for A&M.

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Anyone who says we're a 4 at best has no idea what they're talking about. And maybe you know you don't so that's fine. And we could be a 4-seed! But to not acknowledge the chance of a 3-seed and suggesting we could be a 5 is disingenuous at best and trolling at worst.

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Obviously we have a chance at a three seed. I just believe it is far far more likely we played ourselves out of it. But, based on the responses, I should probably back off more than a little bit on the hyperbole. I do not wish to be compared to a troll. My bad.

Isn't it baffling to anyone else that UNC can still probably get in the field with only ONE Quad 1 win? If I'm a Texas fan and they got in over me, I'd be livid.

t - cam said:

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Fquin said:

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t - cam said:

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LouisvilleAg said:

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Fquin said:

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I'm telling you, the sooner this board takes off its maroon glasses and we make peace with the fact the Aggies are a 4 seed at best and if things go terribly wrong possibly even a 5 seed. You will all sleep better. We still have to beat everybody in our bracket to get where we want. It's all about style matchups for A&M.

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Disagree with this completely. There is one thing that differentiates us from everyone else around the 3, 4, and 5 seeds and that is our non conference schedule. Not only did we play a ridiculous schedule, we also had a pretty damn good record. And most of our losses came in the toughest league in the history of college basketball. I can understand a 4, but there is absolutely zero chance we get a 5.

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I just realize I hide Fquin. You quoting him reminds me that he's insanely annoying and wrong nearly all the time.

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This is comical coming from the likes of t-cam. If Colleyville Ag, Bobinator or Louisville Ag call me out like this it would mean something. But, they understand frustrated hyperbole. t-cam I still like you though.

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You're just only negative. That's why you bother me.

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I disagree. You probably only retain my negative posts as they seem to illicit more emotion out of you. My many positive posts come across as much more innocuous unless I am defending a player or coach. I still like you though.

AggieNattie said:

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Isn't it baffling to anyone else that UNC can still probably get in the field with only ONE Quad 1 win? If I'm a Texas fan and they got in over me, I'd be livid.

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If the committee is actually watching games, they would know that both teams should be in.

Texas has been erratic, but has really nice wins. UNC is playing tourney level basketball, beating up bubble teams and lower. UNC is hurt by all of their Q1 opportunities being against top 10 teams...
Duke 3x
Clemson
Louisville
Kansas (when ranked #1)
Florida
Auburn
Alabama
Michigan State

They've not had any Vanderbilt/UGA/OU type games.

The committee should go pick on the Mountain West and not hold the ACC to 3 bids.

The ACC is "holding" themselves to 3 bids by being an awful league this year. UGA and OU are better teams, and proved as much in nonconference play. UNC should find a way to beat teams like Pitt and Stanford (at home). At some point you should be required to actually win a tough game, not just be rewarded for scheduling.

AggieNattie said:

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Isn't it baffling to anyone else that UNC can still probably get in the field with only ONE Quad 1 win? If I'm a Texas fan and they got in over me, I'd be livid.

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Texas won some games in conference but ……. Only won 6 conference games overall, lost to South Carolina and did not beat a quality team in OOS (not hyperbole, they beat no one decent). Actually not a good resume at all. They will be fortunate if that gets them in the tourney.

Saturday check in with the @MarchMadnessMBB Men's Basketball Selection Committee with @NCAA SVP Dan Gavitt: 1-8 initial seed lines done; 34 of 37 at-large selected but 8 spots left because at least 5 teams will become automatic qualifiers after championship games. There are 19… pic.twitter.com/f5JtfQmrJk

— Andy Katz (@TheAndyKatz) March 15, 2025

OP updated through the late Friday night results.

My gut tells me the committee knows they will need to spend even more time on bracketing principles today than they normally do on Saturday and really need to pick final at larges today. The only relevant games that would hold that back are:

MWC Final
Big West Final
American potential for bid stealer (if Memphis doesn't win)
A10 potential for bid stealer (if VCU doesn't win)

The easy button (lazy) solution is clear and its one i fear the committee is likely to take -

MWC Final - winner gets the auto bid and 11 seed, loser is out

Big West Final - winner gets the auto bid and 11 seed, loser is out

American - Memphis is in and gets their seed locked in today (7 or 8) and they bump out the last team in if they have to.

A10 - 1 bid league and makes the determination that VCU has to win the league to get in.

That would be the best case scenario for UNC/Texas/Xavier/Indiana and would avoid having to compare their resumes against the loser of the MWC/Big West games that happen later this evening.

So MWC is essentially locked in at 4 bids, Big West 1, A10 1 in my opinion, even if they have teams right along the cut line that if these games were earlier this week would allow for more time to fully consider them.

Basically - even though it is not supposed to matter, i can't see the committee arguing themselves into getting 5 bids for the MWC and 3 for the ACC.

Do we think these guys still actually fill this thing out by hand or is there some kind of program they just plug the seed list into? Surely it's the latter right?

I would say VCU and UC San Diego would have a better chance at an at-large bid because they won their regular season and therefore already in the committee's matrix of picking teams.

My gut says they are screwed if they lose, but they do have some things working in their favor.

bobinator said:

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Do we think these guys still actually fill this thing out by hand or is there some kind of program they just plug the seed list into? Surely it's the latter right?

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If you watch the videos from the link Colleyville posted to me, especially the 3rd video, it shows a program they use. They didn't define it, but I am sure someone can name it.

The fact that the 1-8 selection lines are already decided shows how little the end of conference tournaments impact their process. Sure they hold out hope for the miracle bid stealers but for teams like A&M of the past who hope a "deep run " will make a difference, it's just Fools folly. It ain't gonna happen. I'm just happy we aren't in that situation for a change and despite all the Chicken Little's on here with our tu loss, it probably had minimal effect on our seeding

That's what I was wondering because if they have a program it saves a lot of time so locking down the seed list today isn't as necessary.

If we are a 3 seed and get Wichita or Denver, are there 6 seeds that we are more or less likely to draw based on where those 6 seeds can end up or can they go anywhere?

ColleyvilleAg06 said:

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This pdf is 14 years old. The NCAA publishes their updated procedure at their website.

https://www.ncaa.com/news/basketball-men/article/2025-01-16/how-field-68-di-mens-teams-picked-march-madness-each-season

That confusing language (which was referring to the principles of conference teams not playing each other) was reworded.

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Here it is

They can go anywhere. Theoretically they're supposed to protect the top four seeds from a home court disadvantage for the first weekend but it doesn't always work out that way.

Got it, thanks

Interesting, it's somehow both smarter and dumber than I'd have expected lol.

Really feel like we are trending to a 4 seed (for example, see ESPN's latest update), but Bracket Matrix points to a much higher probability of a 3-seed:

97 brackets through March 14th:

3-seed = 70 brackets (72%)
4-seed = 26 brackets (27%)
5-seed = 1 bracket (1%)

In my opinion with the way we are playing right now, we really need a 3-seed to make it out of the first weekend.

Charlie Moran said:

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The fact that the 1-8 selection lines are already decided shows how little the end of conference tournaments impact their process. Sure they hold out hope for the miracle bid stealers but for teams like A&M of the past who hope a "deep run " will make a difference, it's just Fools folly. It ain't gonna happen. I'm just happy we aren't in that situation for a change and despite all the Chicken Little's on here with our tu loss, it probably had minimal effect on our seeding

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I am guessing we are locked in as a 3 seed. The Big 10 tourney runs by Maryland and Wisconsin will end up not mattering.

Even if they seeded the top 4 seed lines last night (I personally think they did those on Thursday and maybe even Wednesday) then this is what they were looking at:

We still have the best WAB and our OOC SOS (and record in those games) shines.

https://bracketologists.com/compare/iowa-state-cyclones;arizona-wildcats;maryland-terrapins;wisconsin-badgers;texas-am-aggies

LouisvilleAg said:

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bobinator said:

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Do we think these guys still actually fill this thing out by hand or is there some kind of program they just plug the seed list into? Surely it's the latter right?

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If you watch the videos from the link Colleyville posted to me, especially the 3rd video, it shows a program they use. They didn't define it, but I am sure someone can name it.

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For the operations research nerds out there, it would just be a linear optimization assignment problem, no? Minimize total travel distances given the following constraints: seed lines within a given range, conference relationships or games already played against each other, etc. I'm no OR guy but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night….

We got eliminated and a couple Big Ten teams had big wins so Lunardi shuffles em around. That doesnt worry me and i wouldnt pay attention to it. I pay attention when Lunardi moves a team for no apparent reason.

In fact this helps, if we go back to a 3 for no reason tonight or tomorrow, theres an indicator to look for

Eh, I think the bracketologists have what you might call a "need to do something" bias. I think they talk themselves into changing things just because. Especially the ones that are on live tv hits.

It'd be boring to go on live tv 35 times today saying nothing matters.

I'm no Colley or Lunardi… I don't how the Committee will do it, but the Ags will be bracketed to play tu early, with the winner playing Bama in the second weekend. TV executives never pass up a state of Texas vs state of Alabama sports narrative. They will also create a Duke & Kentucky scenario.