Lobofan2003

This does not take into account all of today's results, only the Noon ET games (specifically the ND/South Florida was included).

#1 seeds: Kansas, Syracuse, Kentucky, Villanova
#2 seeds: Duke, Purdue, West Virginia, Georgetown
#3 seeds: Kansas State, Wisconsin, Texas, Michigan State
#4 seeds: New Mexico, Tennessee, Temple, Georgia Tech

Last Four In: Louisville, Dayton, Old Dominion, Cincinnati
Last Four Out: Marquette, Notre Dame, VCU, South Florida
Next Four Out: Minnesota, Washington, Virginia Tech, Illinois

The entire bracket and matchups can be found here .

As always questions and comments are appreciated and special thanks to Beer for helping me with making the bracketing process easier.

My latest edition of bracketology can be found here .

I have tried something new in this bracket; re-balancing the brackets (by my S-curve rankings) after adjusting matchups and sometimes seeds to fit the Principles & Procedures, this has proven to add to an already lengthy bracketing process. So I am going to ask my good friend on here, Beer, to help me out with some Excel stuff to make it easier.

As always, comments and questions are appreciated.

I have made a new bracket using a new method to balance out the regions based on my S-Curve based on games through Wednesday night. (See Dantheman's February 4th Bracketology thread for my S-Curve). However I am too tired to check for rematches tonight, so I will wait to post the matchups until the morning or afternoon, whenever a I have time to do that.

Meanwhile here are the seed lines:

#1 seeds: Kansas, Villanova, Syracuse, Kentucky
#2 seeds: Duke, Purdue, West Virginia, Georgetown
#3 seeds: Kansas St., Texas, Michigan St., Wisconsin
#4 seeds: Temple, New Mexico, Vanderbilt, Tennessee
#5 seeds: Georgia Tech, Wake Forest, BYU, Ohio St.
#6 seeds: Gonzaga, Pittsburgh, Butler, Baylor
#7 seeds: Xavier, Rhode Island, Florida St., Texas A&M
#8 seeds: Northern Iowa, Missouri, Oklahoma St., UNLV
#9 seeds: UAB, Clemson, Charlotte, Mississippi
#10 seeds: Cincinnati, Richmond, Old Dominion, California
#11 seeds: Louisville, Florida, Dayton, Cornell
#12 seeds: South Florida, Maryland, Marquette, Siena
#13 seeds: Utah State, Tulsa, Kent State, Oakland
#14 seeds: College of Charleston, Pacific, Sam Houston St., Murray St.
#15 seeds: Weber St., Jacksonville, Morgan St., Coastal Carolina
#16 seeds: Arkansas St., Stony Brook, Robert Morris

Play-in Game: Lehigh vs. Jackson State

*NOTE that Florida St. and Northern Iowa were swapped seed lines; Northern Iowa would have been a 7 seed and Florida St. would have been an 8 seed

Last Four In: Dayton, South Florida, Maryland, Marquette
Last Four Out: Arizona, St. Mary's, San Diego State, Minnesota
Next Four Out: North Carolina, South Carolina, Seton Hall, William & Mary

I have been working on a new edition of my bracket taking into account the results of this weekend's games. I don't have the matchups worked out yet, but here are the seeds:

#1 seeds: Kansas, Villanova, Syracuse, Kentucky
#2 seeds: Georgetown, Duke, Michigan St., Purdue
#3 seeds: West Virginia, Texas, Kansas St., Temple
#4 seeds: Vanderbilt, New Mexico, Wisconsin, Pittsburgh
#5 seeds: Tennessee, Georgia Tech, Wake Forest, BYU
#6 seeds: Gonzaga, Butler, Ohio St., Baylor
#7 seeds: Missouri, Xavier, Rhode Island, Oklahoma St.
#8 seeds: UAB, UNLV, Northern Iowa, Florida St.
#9 seeds: Mississippi, Texas A&M, Cincinnati, Charlotte
#10 seeds: Connecticut, Clemson, Florida, California,
#11 seeds: Richmond, Seton Hall, Dayton, Old Dominion
#12 seeds: William & Mary, Maryland, Cornell, Utah State
#13 seeds: Siena, Oakland, Kent State, College of Charleston
#14 seeds: George Mason, Sam Houston St., Pacific, Murray State
#15 seeds: Weber State, Jacksonville, Coastal Carolina, Morgan State
#16 seeds: Arkansas St., Stony Brook, Robert Morris, Lehigh, Jackson State

Last Four In: Dayton, William & Mary, Old Dominion, Maryland
Last Four Out: Minnesota, Louisville, Arizona, St. Mary's
Next Four Out: North Carolina, San Diego State, South Carolina, Wichita State


Edit: You can find all of the matchups here .

It took a long time to avoid all the rematches and follow the procedures. There were two switches in seed lines to avoid rematches and avoid procedural violations. UNLV and Oklahoma St. were switched as well as William & Mary and Dayton.

I will be participating in a live college basketball chat with GTucker tomorrow at 12 Noon EST. Which is really early for me because I am on the West Coast and don't usually get up before 9, but I will do my best to roll out of bad at 9 tomorrow morning.

We'll be talking about the big games of the day and I can answer any of your Bracketology guestions as well. Please see the College Basketball forum on www.sportsmemorabliagt.webs.com for a link to the live chat.

It's funny how things can change so quickly. Last week, prior to Saturday, Oklahoma State was the last team out of my bracket. Now with wins in the last week over Kansas State and Texas A&M, the Cowboys are all the way up to a #6 seed.

Things also changed quickly for Kentucky who was the #1 overal seed just briefly, before losing their undefeated mark at South Carolina. The Wildcats hang on to the last #1 seed for now, but they must watch out for Texas, Kansas State and Duke who all have better computer numbers.

Without further ado my top seeds:
#1 Seeds: Kansas (#1 overall seed), Villanova, Syracuse, Kentucky
#2 Seeds: Duke, Kansas State, Texas, Michigan State
#3 Seeds: Georgetown, West Virginia, Purdue, Vanderbilt
#4 Seeds: Pittsburgh, Gonzaga, Wisconsin, Temple

You can find the rest of my bracket, including pairings and locations, here .

A couple of notes on procedural changes made within the bracket:

Kansas would normally get the winner of the Play-In (Opening Round) Game as the #1 Overall Seed, but they are given geographic prefence and placed in Oklahoma City for the 1st two rounds. Oklahoma City is a Thurs./Sat. site; the Play-In winner must play in a Fri./Sun. site and is thus placed against Villanova in Buffalo in my bracket.

Xavier and Rhode Island were switched spots in order to avoid a rematch between Kansas St. and Xavier in the 2nd Round. Otherwise Xavier would have been a 7 seed and Rhode Island an 8 seed.

As always questions and comments are appreciated.

I usually post my bracketology on Friday, but this week I had to fly out of town for a job interview on Thursday, so this is a day late. It does not take into account any of the results from Saturday.

The biggest shakeup in this week's bracket is on the 1 and 2 seed lines. With Kansas St.'s victory over Texas they move up to a 2 seed and knock the Longhorns down to a 2-seed. It was a really close call between Syracuse and Texas for the final #1 seed, in reality both are deserving of a 1 seed, but Syracuse's better RPI and SOS gave them the nod. Below you see all of the top seeds:

#1 seeds: Kentucky (#1 overall seed), Kansas, Villanova, Syracuse
#2 seeds: Texas, Kansas St., Georgetown, Duke
#3 seeds: Pittsburgh, Purdue, Michigan St., W. Virginia
#4 seeds: Wisconsin, Temple, Tennessee, Gonzaga

The other difficult part was the last four teams in and the last four teams out. You could just easily switch any or all of the last four teams in and out.

As of Friday:
Last Four Temas In- Florida St., Louisville, St. John's, Wichita St.
Last Four Teams Out- Oklahoma St., VCU, Illinois, Richmond

See the entire bracket here: Lobofan's 2003 Bracketology

Thanks for all your comments and questions.

The main headline from this edition of bracketology is that the Pac-10 is at this point in time a one-bid league. Do I think the league will be a one-bid league when all is said and done? No, but I have to be true to my bracketing principles that I seed teams based on if the season ended today. Eventually I think Washington will do well enough in league play to earn a bid along with California. The biggest winners of the fact that the Pac-10 only received 1 bid are the rest of the big six Power Leagues and the A-10. The other five Power Leagues and the A-10 all received AT LEAST 5 bids.

Kentucky and Texas are nearly even for the #1 overall seed, but I gave it to Texas. Kentucky does, however, get the winner of the Play-in (Opening Round) Game in the First Round due to the fact that the winner of the Play-in Game must play at a Fri/Sun site. Another difficult choice for me was whether or not Syracuse or Kansas received the 4th #1 seed, which ended up going to Syracuse. Neither team leads their league, but Syracuse got the nod with a 5-0 road/neutral record compared to Kansas' 4-1 record.

Seed Lines 1-5:
#1 Seeds- Texas, Kentucky, Villanova, Syracuse
#2 Seeds- Kansas, Duke, West Virginia, Georgetown
#3 Seeds- Purdue, Kansas State, Michigan State, Pittsburgh
#4 Seeds- Wisconsin, Gonzaga, Wake Forest, Temple
#5 Seeds- Vanderbilt, Clemson, Connecticut, Tennessee

See all of the matchups on the Ya Sports! site:
http://sportsmemorabiliagt.webs.com
/apps/forums/topics/show/1919944-br
acketology-lobofan2003-1-15-10

One final note on the bracket:
Ohio St. and California were both moved down from the 9 seed line to the 10 seed line to fit Bracketing Principles and Procedures; they were switched with Dayton and Texas A&M who were originally 10 seeds in my bracket in the same regions as Ohio State and California.

Thanks and please feel free to comment and ask questions.

Edit: Thanks to Beer who pointed out a couple of errors in my bracket at the Ya Sports! site:

In the West Region: 2 Kansas vs. 15 ARKANSAS ST. (not LSU), Arkansas St. is the Sun Belt Champ and plays Kansas, that was merely a typo on my part.

Also, the "Pod" with Georgetown as the 2 seed is played in Providence instead of Milwaukee; I merely forgot to put the heading above those two games.

In my latest edition of bracketology the Boilermakers get some love. They are my #1 overall seed, allowing them to stay close to home and play in the Midwest Regional in St. Louis.

The other three #1 seeds are: Kansas-South Region, Texas-West Region, and Kentucky- East Region

#2 seeds: Duke, West Virginia, Syracuse, and Kansas St.
#3 seeds: Georgetown, Villanova, Michigan St. and Pittsburgh
#4 seeds: Connecticut, Gonzaga, Wisconsin and Temple

Teams with poor strengths of schedule got penalized either in their seeding or not making the bracket at all. Baylor, a 1-loss team, bearly got in as an 11 seed while Virginia Tech and Miami are out of the bracket entirely due to their poor non-conference schedules.

Just like the NCAA committee does, injuries were taken into account. Ohio St. and California are the two best described by how injuries into account. Both have suffered injuries to key players and would otherwise have very shaky resumes but remain in the bracket with the expectation that the teams' performances will improve once those players return.

All 65 teams and the matchups can be found here:
http://sportsmemorabiliagt.webs.com
/apps/forums/topics/show/1882998-br
acketology-1-8-10

Merry Christmas to everyone out there who reads this.

I have posted my first bracketology of the 2009-10 season in cooperation with GTucker on his site, Ya Sports! I will be posting throughout on the season on his site or on here how I think the NCAA committee would seed teams if the season where to end at that very moment. My #1 seeds for my 1st bracketology are: Texas, Syracuse, Kansas and Kentucky.

You can find my entire first bracketology here:
http://sportsmemorabiliagt.webs.com
/apps/forums/topics/show/1815834-ch
ristmas-bracketology

Please leave comments and questions; however, keep in mind that Bracketology is very difficult and takes a lot of time and effort, especially when trying to follow all of the Bracketing Prinicple and Procedures that the NCAA uses so please be respectful of myself and other people on here that do this, we are not getting paid to do this so outright attacks will not be tolerated.

However, you will see that last year I was very successful in the final bracketology on Selection Sunday, as seen on the Bracket Matrix website which scores all of the bracketologists:
Bracket Matrix

Thanks everybody, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

I will be doing my own version of bracketology again this year. I've just started transitioning from watching college football to watching more college basketball. The season is still early with not enough games having been played for me to do a bracketology based on the way I do my bracketology.

My bracketology is different from the ones you see from writers on CBS and ESPN like Palm and Lunardi in that I don't take into account any kind of preseason expectations or predictions about W-L for the rest of the season. My bracketology projections are based entirely on results up until that point in the season, acting as if the season was over and it was Selection Sunday. I also try to follow all the Principles and Procedures that the NCAA Selection Committee uses in seeding teams, creating matchups to avoid rematches, and sending to various locations (pods).

You can check how I did last year in comparision to other bracketologists at the end of the season at the Bracket Matrix site http://bracketproject.50webs.com/ma
trix_2009.html . If you must get your fix of Bracketology this early in the season visit Dan's blog http://dantheman4250.blogs.cbssport
s.com/mcc/blogs/entry/6539696/18722
907 where he does a bracket based a little bit on preseason expectations and results of the season thus far. As time goes on his bracket will be become more like my style of bracket based solely on performance to date. I hope to have the first edition of my bracketology up around the beginning of the year once non-conference play winds down and the RPI becomes more stable.

September is one of the greatest times of year if you're a sports fan (especially of baseball and/or football).

The baseball penant races are winding down, it looks as if most of the races have been decided although the AL Central may come down to the final week between the Tigers and the Twins. Even without many exciting races, September allows clubs to bring up young kids and get a chance for fans to see the future and for teams that will be going to the playoffs to set up their rotations and get players healthy for the playoffs.

College football is off to a fast start with a lot of exciting upsets to start the season. Boise State beat Oregon, BYU beat Oklahoma and Houston beat Oklahoma State just to name a few. The non-AQ conferences are making big strides against the AQ conferences. The perception of the Mountain West is growing off the charts after Utah's win over Alabama in the Sugar Bowl and the afore-mentioned BYU win. Is this the year that a Mountain West team can get into the BCS with one loss or even possibly get into the (Mythical) National Championship game if they go undefeated? Before we can even think about that though both Utah and BYU have tough matchups tomorrow if they are going to stay undefeated; Utah plays Oregon at Autzen Stadium and BYU plays Florida State at home in Provo. Both teams also have to play a tough TCU team later in the year in conference play. In addition the Mountain West teams, Boise State looks like they could also contend for a BCS spot; could two non-AQ teams possibly get BCS-bowl bids this year?

If the excitement of baseball and college football wasn't enough, how about the start of football season? From trying to dominate my fantasy league once again this year to watching the resurrgent Seahawks here in the Northwest there's plenty for me to watch in the NFL this season. What has you excited this season in the NFL?

With Beltre gone for 6-8 weeks (and even with him in the lineup) it is painfully obvious that the Mariners need a power/RBI producing bat to add to the lineup if they want to stay in the AL West race.

The Angels have been on a tear lately and are threatening to run away with the division here pretty soon if they keep up their current pace. Meanwhile, the Mariners showed in the first game of the Yankee series that they can not score enough runs to keep up with talented offensive teams. Now, management may decide eventually that the Mariners are out of the race and not make a trade. In all honesty, the Mariners are playing better than I would have thought at this point; nobody could have thought they would be only 3 1/2 games out at this point. However, as a fan, I don't want to see any potential opportunity or hope of making the playoffs go by the wayside. Mariner fans have suffered in agony the past few years and it is time for management to show the fans that they want to return the Mariners to the success and exictement of the playoff runs of the early part of this decade just as much as the fans want the Mariners to return to the playoffs.

The Mariners have finally shaken off their good start and begun to play like they did last year.

After a 12-6 start the M's are now 15-15 and not score any runs. Over their 5 game losing streak they have managed a total of 9 runs. This is looking way too much like last year, no offense. Branyan has shown flashes, but other than that there is no power in the middle of the order; Beltre has yet to hit a home run.

Not that it really matters when you can't score runs, but the back end of the rotation has been horrible as well. Silva and Jakubauskas aren't getting the job done, its time to call up some starting pitchers from the minors and give them a try, anything would be better than watching Silva pitch another game.

The Mariners gave their fans a glimmer of hope at the start of the season, but now it is starting to look just like last year.

Boy was I totally wrong about the Mariners struggling without Ichiro. Instead they are 7-2 and Ichiro hit a Grand Slam in his return.

I don't expect the Mariners to keep up this pace, but the AL West looks wide open this year. The Angels pitching staff has been struck by tragedy and injury; the Rangers can hit, but they can't pitch; and the A's are, well the A's. If Griffey can lead the M's into the playoffs in his return to Seattle, he will go from idollized to immortalized status. One thing is for sure, as a Mariners fan, this season has already been better than the horribleness that was last season.

It is a good for Northwest sports; the M's off to a good start, the Sounders have begun their 1st MLS season and the Blazers tied for the NW Division title and have a home-playoff series in the 1st Round.