Bracketology, Just Because: Ohio State and Florida Edition

Thad Matta, one of country's finest olden-style white person Bubble pugilists

In the edict for those of us on the Intertubes that use words to describe college basketball in informed (hopefully) and entertaining (rarely) ways, the right to create a bracket is indelible. It's right there with making fun of Dick Vitale and finding Erin Andrews attractive in the "Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness" portion of our Constitution. And even though you can go basically anywhere else to get one of these bad boys (including here, here, here and here), I'm going to post my projected bracket every Tuesday and Friday until Selection Sunday anyway, with each including a extra special bonus*: a profile of a Bubble team or two.
*bonus may not be extra or special

Since it's basically impossible to post an entire bracket in a Blogger post without burning the retinas of readers, you can check it out in beautiful yet annoying spreadsheet form by clicking the link below. (Conference champs, the yellow cells, based on current league standings).

Bracketology, March 7

Last Four In:
Maryland (62)
St. Joe's (63)
Kentucky (64)
Ohio State (65)
First Four Out:
New Mexico (66)
Florida (67)
Syracuse (68)
Western Kentucky (69)

Bubble Profiles
Previously:
March 4, Maryland and New Mexico
February 29, St. Joe's and Kentucky
February 26, Rhode Island and UAB

IN: Ohio State
Record: 18-12 (9-8, Big Ten), 4-8 road, 1-9 vs. Top 50, 6-10 vs. Top 100
RPI: 55
Key Wins: Syracuse, Florida, Purdue
Key Losses: North Carolina, Butler, Purdue, Michigan State, Tennessee, Indiana (2), Wisconsin

See what I'm doing here?! With the two teams from last year's National Championship in the same edition?! Isn't that nifty?!... OK, enough of that. Both Ohio State and Florida suck. But at the present moment, after that big win over Purdue the other night, the Buckeyes happen to suck less. It seems as though most Bubble teams simply beat the teams they should and lose to the better squads and with that 1-9 record against the Top 50, Ohio State is no different. But the reason I think they are in right now, is that most of those 12 losses came against top teams, as you can see above. They have nine losses to likely Tournament teams and the other three were all in-conference and on the road. It's not the greatest of resumes, but given how poor the Bubble is, strength-of-schedule is probably going to be a big differentiator. Plus the Buckeyes have beaten fellow Bubblers Syracuse and Florida, which is a nice way to solve any head-to-head comparisons, if the Committee is interested in such things.

How To Stay/Get In: Well if they beat Michigan State Sunday, the Buckeyes can probably punch their ticket. If that doesn't happen, they drop out of the field and will need at least a conference tournament semifinal run to get in. A Big Ten run like that would include a win over someone in the top four of the league and they are only 1-5 combined (and would be 1-6 if they lost to the Spartans) against Indiana, Purdue, Michigan State and Wisconsin. If they don't get in, do not worry Buckeye fans, due to the brilliance of YouTube, you will always have this.

OUT: Florida
Record: 21-9 (8-7, SEC), 4-6 road, 2-6 vs. Top 50, 3-8 vs. Top 100
RPI: 63
Key Wins: Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Temple
Key Losses: Florida State, Ohio State, Mississippi, Tennessee (2), LSU, Mississippi State
It would have probably been a good idea for the Gators to have gotten a win over either Tennessee or Mississippi State in the past week, but they didn't and now will probably need some kind of miracle (dare I say, Magic) to keep a three-peat a technical possibility. I actually think Florida is probably good enough to be in the Tournament, but as you can see, it's only beaten one surefire Tourney team. And losing to LSU at home is pretty inexcusable too. Oh, and racking up wins over fierce competition like North Dakota State, Tennessee Tech, North Carolina Central, North Florida, Stetson, Jacksonville, Florida A & M... deep breath... GeorgiaSouthernCharlestonSouthernandVermont in a pretty terrible non-conference slate for a two-time defending champ isn't all that impressive either. If they want to hang their hat on the 21 wins, they should probably play some real basketball teams (my research has shown many of the teams mentioned above might not exist).

How To Stay/Get In: Well, the loser of Sunday's Kentucky-Florida game, which should be incredibly entertaining and will contain many dangerous Kentuckians, is probably done for. So the Gators should go ahead and win that. If they do (and I don't think they will), they will probably still need at least a semifinal run in the SEC Tournament. Given the craptasticness of the league besides Tennessee and Vandy, that's probably not too far-fetched but I still wouldn't hold my breath if I were a Florida fan (incidentally, if I was a Florida fan, I would probably spend very little time caring about basketball, you know, because of the beach and sun and hot chicks and all). The ironic thing is for these teams right on the edge of being in or out, like Florida and Ohio State, is that there is almost certainly going to be some upsets in the mid-major tournaments that will steal at-large bids and that even if Florida fulfills the above scenario, they probably won't get in without some serious help.