UC on the Bracket Matrix

I seem to the be one of the few Bearcat fans out there that is still a lot worried about what can go wrong for the Bearcats the last couple of games. I don’t think an NCAA tournament bid is a lock just yet. Most people don’t seem to be worried. Since it’s nearly 2 PM and I have no other ideas for posts, I thought it would be interesting to see what the people who get paid/really like doing mock brackets think about the Bearcats. Instead of going to 71 sites, I fired up the handy dandy Bracket Matrix. 

The average seed for the Bearcats in 71 brackets is a 7 seed. They are seeded as high as 5th on a couple of brackets. That seems a bit silly, as there is nothing in Cincinnati’s resume that seems to say they are that deserving. On the flip side, the Bearcats are seeded 11th on one bracket, which makes them the lowest seeded Big East team in the bunch. Most brackets though, have the Bearcats as a 6 or a 7.

Since that’s not enough for a full post, I decided to play around a little with some of the national brackets. Namely, SI and ESPN. Let’s start with SI first. The man Andy Glockner has Cincinnati as a 10 seed. Andy said in his bubble watch that if the Bearcats lose out, the profile is not there to make the NCAAs. The last time the Bearcats had an NCAA worthy team, they lost their first game in the Big East tournament, and didn’t get in the big dance. He has the Bearcats going against Temple in round 1. That wouldn’t be a terrible match up for UC. Forgetting all the times Cincinnati lost to Temple in the 90s is not easy to do though. The 2 the Bearcats are matched up with is Purdue. The other 7 seeds are UCLA, UNLV, and George Mason. If I had to rank those 4 possible opponents, it would be Temple, UNLV, UCLA and George Mason. Hey, I am buying George Mason. Haven’t seen them play enough times to fully have an opinion on them, but I’ve seen them once or twice and I like their style. Plus, with their long winning streak they are a very confident team. You don’t want to play confident teams in March. 

Joey Brackets at ESPN has the Bearcats as a 7. He would have a potential Sweet 16 match up with Xavier in the wings. The Bearcats would be matched up in Duke’s region, which would probably be in Charlotte. UC would be playing Illinois in round 1. If you ignore the recent history against Illinois in the NCAA tournament, this is a good game for the Bearcats. Illinois is not exactly playing good basketball right now. As long as the Bearcats didn’t talk shit at them and knock over the Illinois sign or whatever they did, the Illini wouldn’t be as pissed off to play Cincinnati. The other 10 seeds are Marquette, Michigan State and Florida State. If I had to rank the 3 opponents it would be Florida State, Illinois, and Michigan State. I don’t want any part of a Tom Izzo coached team in March. You might be like, “Oh Bearcats Blog, Michigan State sucks.” I would say of course they do Susie. That’s what makes them dangerous. They could be the classic team that tanks horribly in the regular season, only to turn it on in the tournament. The anti-Texas. Florida State is playing without their best player, Chris Singleton. They also are a great defensive team, which means a game against the Bearcats would be pretty ugly.

I saw one bracket, don’t know where it was, maybe Rush the Court, that had Cincinnati in the 8/9 with BYU as the 1. I would take that every day of the week. I think Jimmer is great, I like watching him play. I think BYU is soft. The Bearcats seem like they would be the type of team that gave BYU fits. They could slow down the tempo. UC has multiple guys that can guard Jimmer and Jackson Emery. They have a low post presense that BYU doesn’t. The Bearcats don’t have someone that could take the ball at Jimmer to get him in foul trouble though. I think the Bearcats could absolutely out tough BYU in a second round game. Or, they could lose by 20 points. Either or. It’s March everybody. Spring is in the air. The brackets are churning out. Life is good.