Bubble Watch - cheering guide for 03.08
With deference to True Blue 9's a-maize-ing daily rooting guides, below is a quick 'n dirty attempt at Michigan's rooting interest for games played today.
It should go without saying that none of this matters if Michigan doesn't take care of business against Rutger again tomorrow (and, most likely, Purdue on Friday as well) - but there are several very bubbly teams in action today (3 in the ACC alone!) that are within shouting distance of Michigan on the S-Curve - teams to root for are in bold:
Georgia Tech v. Pittsburgh (-7.0) - 2:30 PM EST, Greensboro
Pittsburgh has fallen to the last 4 byes/ ~5 teams above the cut line on most brackets. 1 more bad L could bring Michigan's H2H dominating W over Pitt in play
Ohio State v. Wisconsin (Ohio State (!) -2.0) - 6:30 PM EST, Chicago
Wisconsin and Michigan are very close on all seed line brackets - let's hope for 1 more nail in the (underdog to Ohio State!) 12th B1G-seeded Badgers resume.
Boston College v. North Carolina (-11.5) - 7:30 PM EST, Greensboro
North Carolina's continued underwhelming performances against Q1 competition - a sole win to date - should have them outside looking in, pending an ACC tourney run. Cheering for the Eagles to nip that in the bud today.
Virginia Tech v. NC State (-2.0) - 9:30 PM EST (after the game above), Greensboro
Our 3rd ACC Tourney game of the day with bubble implications - NC State is perilously close to the cut line despite a 12-8 conference record in a subpar year for the ACC. Rooting for the Hokies to make the decision that much tougher on the Selection Committee Sunday.
Oklahoma v. Oklahoma State (-1.0) - 9:30 PM EST, Kansas City
Our first Big XII entry pits two intrastate rivals struggling for NIT eligibility against each other. Ok State has an identical 17-14 record to Michigan, and joins them among most first-four-out brackets. Going for the Sooners to drop 1 more crucial resume nail in the Cowboys coffin.
Oregon State v. Arizona State (-11.0) - 11:30 PM EST, Las Vegas
For those burning the midnight oil and thirsty for Pac-12 after dark, here ya go. The Sun Devils season seemed to be resurrected after the inexplicable Arizona made FT allowing the 2/3 court buzzer-beater prayer heave that vaulted Az State back into bracket consideration. Oregon State is bad in a bad conference - hoping for some beaver magic in Sin CIty tonight (tomorrow? time-zone dependent)
Much more action on tomorrow's slate - let's have a few of these drop our way prior to a deep B1G tourney run!
GO BLUE
Thanks. I love the cheering guides. Win the bubble.
Great work here, Amaize! I'll let you handle this today (and tomorrow if you feel like it) but I'll plan on getting back on it WHEN we beat Rutgers (not if).
Go Blue!
Thank you kindly - I had a good template to piggyback off of, ha...so jealous you can see it live!
No promises on tomorrow; CPA in tax season, in full-on extension mode with 65+ hour workweeks - I was able to draft this in 5 mins, and may not have time for a more extensive deeper dive (more teams in play) tomorrow - but I will if I can!
GO BLUE
Just throwing this out there. My partner has been with me to see Michigan basketball live 4 times:
- 2016 at Crisler, a win against Furman
- 2018 at the United Center, a win against Iowa in the Big Ten tourney
- 2022 at the NCAA tourney, the amazing comeback win against Colorado State
- 2023 at Welsh Ryan, a dominating win against a surging Northwestern team.
We're hoping to make it 5 for 5 tomorrow. I've already got him committed to going to Friday's game assuming we win tomorrow. Y'all can thank me now lol ;)
Should we be rooting for them Charley Boyz?
Only if Oakland is still in play
Good stuff.
ACC tourney might (slightly) open the door for Michigan if they can win 2 in the BTT. And OSU absolutely can beat Wisconsin and if they do I think the Badgers are out of the tourney and Rutgers may well follow with a loss to the Wolverines.
That’s my hope. Michigan beats Rutgers for second time in a row and Wisconsin gets beat early on. Most brackets have 9 teams in and Michigan and Penn St can be those last 2 teams.
Yeah. PSU is unlikely to fall even with a loss to Illinois but Rutgers and Wisconsin are in the same boat as UM in terms of duking it out for the final spot.
It sort of sucks PSU is likely to get in because they won two bullshit games to end the year but otherwise their top-line stats aren't great (3rd in offense and 11th in defense in the Big 10 while UM is 4th and 2nd) and played (I believe) the easiest non-con schedule in the league. They trail UM on KenPom and NET ratings. I don't have any particular ill-will toward the Nittany Lions but they're the most experienced team in the country and are just going to get bounced on the first weekend anyway.
Beaver magic in Vegas will put you in a municipal court, not on a basketball court.
I could've worded that so much better, if I actually took time to think about what I was quickly posting -
'Not unlike many of your author's previous drunken Vegas escapades, we will be desperately searching/ praying for some unlikely Beaver Magic luck in Sin City after the clock strikes midnight...' or something to that effect.
I'm pulling for a win Thursday afternoon against Rutgers and a snowstorm Thursday night so I can watch Michigan extend their season against Purdue.
It feels weird going from cheering for Pitt to boost Michigan's profile to rooting against Pitt to boost Michigan's profile. I hate life on the bubble.
Yea, for me, it's simply with Pitt:
- We want them to lose tonight
or
- We want them to make a run to the championship game (or as far as possible) and get that game to be a Quad-1 win.
For me, the worst nightmare is a win for Pitt tonight and a loss tomorrow. That almost certainly has them in but they don't get to 50 Net.
At this point I'd rather Pitt just get bumped out. The incremental value of a another Q1 win from Pitt is small (if UM gets in it'll be because they beat 2-3 Q1-level teams in the BTT) but knocking the Panthers down the pecking order gives UM a bit more cushion.
That's exactly my feeling as well. Since Pitt was #50 in the NET, they've gone 2-2 and fallen to #57. With each additional data point diluting the value of the entire resume as a whole, in a macro sense, teams are not moving much - #57 wont crack top-50 now, and there's a real non-zero chance we end up on the same seed line, bringing H2H into play.
I'm going to have to hold my nose cheering for Ohio (or, anti-Wiscy) today, and also for Sparty against (presumably) Iowa Friday -
Michigan can double their Q1 wins from 3 to 6 by Friday by default, by beating Rutger and Purdue, and sparty beating Iowa; a Saturday semi against them is a win-win - either we beat sparty for 3 Q1 wins in 3 days, or they beat us after beating Iowa, pushing #31 over the Q1 threshold and granting our earlier W H2H Q1 status.
Lots of bubble teams are in the 3-5 Q1 W range. 6 (with 2 Ws and a sparty over iowa) should do it for Michigan, imo.
This debate continues to rage on and it's certainly debate-able but 1) It's still highly unlikely Pitt "just gets bumped out". Even a loss today probably doesn't do that. Maybe, but probably not.
But let's even assume they would drop to the cut line. Michigan's biggest resume hole right now is a poor 3-11 q1 record. To your own point, they need 2-3 more q1 level wins. If they get one of them from Pitt moving up to q1, they'd probably only need to actually win two more in the BTT. And that improves their resume relative to the entire bubble.
They need to move up the bubble, not just hope that enough teams will move down it. Because that's not going to happen. The bubble is largely static. For every team that moves down it, there will be teams making runs to move up it. Michigan needs the best resume possible. That means Pitt being a top 50 team.
1.) Pitt cannot crack top-50 mathematically, without winning the ACC by ~26-27 ppg AND having multiple 51-55s fall back. Pitt could not have progressed higher than 53 even by beating ND, and would have fallen from 50 to 53-54 with a 3-1 streak. They're not getting there.
2.) Michigan can get 3 additional Q1 wins by winning 2 games, provided Sparty beats Iowa (Saturday win-win outlined above). This also puts Michigan right next to Pitt, and the H2H could very well be the determining factor in one of those coveted few bubble 'in' chairs.
Are you saying that they need to win all four ACC tourney games but an average of 26-27 points to get to top 50?!?! I'm sorry, but that's not the case. Not even close.
I do agree that at this point it's pretty unlikely they get to top 50 but it's mathematically possible they get there even today (with a win of probably 40+, which obviously isn't happening but every point matters). A win by double digits today and two more wins to make the final will get them there. Two blowouts and a close loss in the semis probably gets them there too.
Drake moved up 12 spots Monday from 64th to 52nd after beating #73 Bradley by 26 points on a neutral court (which matters). Margin of victory matters a lot. It won't take close to what you suggest for Pitt to move up seven spots in that range.
And yes, MSU could also get to top 30 to make that home win a q1 but even better for Michigan's resume if they both get there. Shoot maybe Michigan would only need to beat Rutgers then (I doubt that but maybe).
And like I said above, I do agree that if Pitt loses today and Michigan wins two, there's a chance it could come down to those two teams. I'm fine if Pitt loses today. But they absolutely have a chance to get to top 50 (although probably at this point less likely than them losing today, let's say 10% that they eventually get to top 50, and 20% that they lose today - but we're rooting for one of those tail events).
Margin of victory is capped at 10 points, which is the least-counted component of the NET rating system. Yes, efficiency metrics are uncapped and weigh in elsewhere so margins do matter but one 26-point win doesn't mean a ton in the grand scheme of things. Drake going up likely had to do with a bump in their Team Value Index (which is apparently a secret component) and probably came from the fact they won their conference tourney and got an auto-bid. And Bradley is a solid team; they'd be in the middle of the ACC in terms of rankings. Georgia Tech, by comparison, is 176th per NET. I'm not even sure a 50-point win gets them there.
It also doesn't really matter if a team jumps in and out of a Q1 spot today because they are just as easy to drop out tomorrow. For example, if Pitt did win today by 40+ and jumped to, I don't know, #49 per NET rating, they'd then play Duke tomorrow, a team that beat them by 8 earlier in the year. If they win that then they're on to play Miami (probably) and then on to play in the ACC title. Again, if all those break right Pitt becomes a top-50 win and that's great, but it's just as likely they lose tomorrow (or, hell, today) or Friday and fall back to the low 50s where they are a hurdle to UM's chances of sneaking in the tourney.
That's my larger point here; Michigan's chances of winning hinge way more on just winning games and not trying to shine up the turd that is their Q1 win totals. They've got a bunch of Q2 wins and Pitt is in there; there's a better chance of MSU sneaking into the top-30 and staying there IMO and that's not a team you're competing with for a spot.
Correct, team efficiency is uncapped and is also heavily weighted. Do you want more examples of how much blowouts matter?
When Iowa beat IU by 24 last week they moved up a whopping 10 spots in a range that is more difficult to move up (43rd to 33rd) because the margins are greater / its further out in the bell curve.
Want a more comparable example? When Charleston (ranked 63rd) beat UNCW (ranked 129th) by 32 at home (so not even neutral), they moved up six spots to 57th.
And obviously 100 percent agree that Michigan's chances hinge on their own performances. That point is a given, and there's no debate there.
But we're in a bubble rooting thread. This is about how other teams performances may or may not impact Michigan's chances independent of how Michigan performs.
Yes, MSU has a better chance to get to top 50. That's also irrelevant to the debate about whether Pitt being a top 50 is better for us than them losing today. And we'll never really know.
Another thing that's not debatable is the worst case is they win in chalk fashion which looks like is going to be the case today.
I mean, it's always going to be a debate. But right now Pitt is behind UM per NET, KenPom, and Sagarin. As it relates to NET rating, they're at 57 right now and would have to jump Michigan and 6 other teams to break into the top 50. As you noted the bubble is static and so is NET at this point; there isn't a scalp big enough in the ACC tournament to really rocket them up (Duke is the only top-25 team to NET and they're #24) and a whole lotta anchors/static teams. Sure, if they win the ACC tourney that would probably sneak them into the top-50 but barring that extremely unlikely outcome you'd rather Pitt drop farther down the bubble because then we get into head-to-head comparisons with other bubble teams and UM would have that big H2H win and better overall metrics save for Q1 wins.
As for the value of Q1 wins, again I'm not sold there's as much incremental value for UM compared to some other teams. UM is 3-11 on Q1 games but even 6-12 (which is likely what it would look like if they went 2-1 in the BTT and Pitt rose from the ashes) isn't that much more compelling than 5-12. UNC is another bubble team and they have 1 Q1 win. Rutgers and Nevada, who are fellow bubble teams, have 4 and 5 Q1 wins. PSU has 5. Pitt has 5. It's all dent-and-scratch teams and at this late stage I'd rather have one less resume to consider.
Again, in a perfect world where Pitt is a 9 seed then yeah, would be great if they got to 50 so UM got some benefit out of it. UNC is absolutely hoping UM gets hot because they're a lot closer to 50 than the Panthers and that would give UNC 2 Q1 wins. But Pitt has been mediocre to close the season and so that ship has sailed, in my opinion, of them being a benefit to UM's resume. Now, I'd rather just clear the deck of other bubble teams with comparable resumes.
They don't necessarily need scalps. Blowouts also do the trick.
Drake moved up 12 spots Monday from 64th to 52nd after beating #73 Bradley by 26 points on a neutral court (which matters). Margin of victory matters a lot.
As I said above, it's unlikely they move up to top 50. But it's absolutely possible. It's also unlikely they lose today and also fall out of the field. It is possible though. We're rooting for high variance events with them. Lose today or win big.
Now, I'd rather just clear the deck of other bubble teams with comparable resumes
This simply will not happen. Think about that for a second. 15+ teams aren't going to all lose and move the bubble significantly down without any other teams moving up. It won't happen.
It's all dent-and-scratch teams
Exactly, the margin is razor thin between all of them so one more q1 win could absolutely be the difference.
Technically Pitt losing doesn't boost Michigan's profile. In fact it hurts its profile slightly. The benefit is that it diminishes the profile of a fellow bubble team.
To TB9's point, we continue to root for high variance events from Pitt. Chalk is the worst case scenario because it keeps them in the field but doesn't move them up to top 50.
Seems like most likely of these is Ohio State and Oklahoma. Oregon State is abysmal. BC and VT are below average but who knows - they could spring an upset. GT is pretty bad too.
Win the game.
Hopefully you have to post a "Bubble Watch" on Friday morning....
I'm not really following what other teams are doing anymore. Almost none of that stuff has broken for Michigan and I don't expect it to change this week. Michigan needs to be playing on this Sunday to be in the NCAA tournament. That is how I am looking at it. A win over Purdue gets them to maybe play-in game(?). I'm not trying to hear that and don't want to be on pins and needles all day Saturday and Sunday.
A win over Michigan Sta---- I mean Iowa on Saturday puts them in.
As much as it pains, our rooting interest is for Sparty over (presumably) Iowa Friday. They are currently #31 NET - 1 away from making Michigan's H2H win at Crisler a Q1 win. If Michigan beats Rutger and Purdue (and, frankly, all of this is meaningless if they do not), a Saturday game with sparty is 'house money,' - either adding a Q1 win by beating them again on a neutral court, or presumably adding 1 by sparty beating iowa/Michigan and thus moving up from 31 to top-30. That's 3 additional Q1 wins for Michigan by Friday after 2 games, if sparty holds serve that day.
That is not how I am looking at it. I don't think Saturday would be house money. I think Michigan needs to make it to the BTT final to really be in. I think beating Purdue gets them to a coin toss for a trip to Dayton. I think they need to win Saturday and that it won't really matter who it would be that they beat in the semis.
To clarify, my 'house money' comment was in reference to the fact Michigan picks up another Q1 win Saturday if they play Sparty regardless of beating/losing to them -
Win - neutral court Top-50 = Q1
Lose - Sparty by beating Iowa/Michigan moves up from #31 to Top-30, making the Crisler W a Q1 win.
This gives Michigan 6 Q1 wins. Most bubble teams now have (at very best) 3-5. That could be key, getting #6. Hence, Sparty over iowa.
Yeah, I get that. I just think that with the most recent memory of Michigan being them faceplanting two games in a row, I think the committee wants to see them look and play like a contender. I get that Quad 1 wins are important, I just think that playing in the Big Ten title game would be the best possible look.
No question M beating MSU would be far, FAR better than losing (for multiple reasons like another Q1 win, chance at auto bid, F Sparty, etc).
But agree with TX that there is a small silver lining should we lose and that would be MSU being all but assured a top 30 NET and hence a q1 win for Michigan.
Best case is MSU blows out Iowa by 15+ to move well into the top 30 and then loses close to us to remain in the top 30.
Although my guess is that if we get to the final we'd be in regardless of whether the home MSU game is a q1 or not.
Great posts, love reading these
On a side note, the spread was just announced for tomorrow's game. Michigan opens as 2.5 point favorites. Interesting note that we've beaten the spread in each of the last 5 games.
A total LOL though, the over/under is 133. The teams combined for 103 in their game at Rutgers a few weeks ago.
I'm hammering the under on the game
Nice catch, TB.
Especially check out Rutgers offensive performance after Mag went down -- I'll be one sad Wolverine if RU drops 70+
Under for sure. I'm thinking somewhere around 78-0.
i think we should just win the B1G conference tourney and get an auto bid. just sayin
That Purdue Friday noon game against the #1 seed does remind me a bit of 2017.
Well, looks like we're big Pitt fans the rest of the week. Worst case is they lose tomorrow and thus do us no good. Now we want them to win as much as possible and hopefully get to 50 on the Net!
Yep, rooting interests around them are now totally obvious.
The chalk result today wasn't ideal.
Cole Bajema having 16 points for Washington with 1 minute left in this game is the ultimate swift kick in the nuts.
Sure would be nice having him on this roster.....
Eh, is he any better than Baker?
Fair but I'd trade him for Barnes or Glenn. Is what it is.
Perhaps, but still would be redundant with Baker (and I did look up his numbers, basically the identical player to Baker, right down to being a 6'7 senior) and wouldn't start and that's why he left.
Fine that he left to give M some flexibilty. There was at least a chance Michigan got Shannon with that spot. And then the backup plan was still as good as Bajema.
It is disappointing Barnes hasn't been able to crack the rotation.
OSU up 15 with 7 mins to go in the 1st half. Hate to say it, but Go Bucks!
OSU does look much improved from mid season
Goodness! An 18-point deficit for Wisconsin is like a 40-point deficit with how slow their offense is.
Whew....
Yeah, that certainly doesn’t hurt. And they lost 3 of their last 5, one of them to M.
Pittsburgh winning by a bit (under the KenPom margin) is sort of the worst outcome with that game. They aren't likely to beat Duke tomorrow so they won't be a top 50 win but they also didn't get an anchor loss to hurt their at large odds.
Does feel like Pitt is due for a big game. And other ACC fans are likely to be rooting for them. Plus rooting against Duke is fun lol