AUSTIN (KXAN) — Texas allowed the worst offensive team in the Southeastern Conference to score more than 20 points above their season average Saturday, and that certainly won’t bode well for the Longhorns when the NCAA tournament selection committee starts making decisions.
Not only was the Longhorns’ 84-69 loss brutal because it gave South Carolina its first SEC win in 14 games, but Texas’ metrics took a big hit in key categories that the selection committee uses to award at-large bids.
The loss is considered a Quad 2 loss due to South Carolina’s place in the NET rankings, the committee’s main component in organizing its selections. The Gamecocks were No. 94 going into the matchup and went up five spots to No. 89 following the win. Texas, meanwhile, was No. 35 and then dropped to No. 38 with the loss. With 37 at-large bids available, that’s not a place teams want to be at this point of the season.
Perhaps the biggest stat the selection committee emphasizes is Quad 1 wins, meaning you’ve beaten very good teams throughout the year. Any home win over a NET top 30 team, neutral site wins over the top 50 or road wins over the top 75 teams are considered Quad 1 wins. Texas only has four such wins.
The Longhorns have two Quad 1 and two Quad 2 games left on its regular season schedule, plus however many games they play in the SEC tournament, so there’s not a lot of time to add to that portion of their resume. Wednesday’s game on the road against Arkansas and a March 4 game at Mississippi State are the Quad 1 chances remaining.
A new component to the NET rankings the committee is using is called “wins above bubble.” That’s a metric designed to gauge how a team is projected to do against a typical bubble-level team against the actual results. Typically, teams with NET rankings in the 32-40 range are considered on the bubble for this metric.
In calculations on BartTorvik.com, the Longhorns’ WAB rating was in the negative Sunday afternoon at -0.17, ranked No. 53 among Division I teams. Any value in the negative is certainly not a good thing since it means they’re performing under their projection. It’s a value that fluctuates as more outcomes become available.
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Torvik’s rating system has the Longhorns at No. 43 with a 59.7% chance of receiving an at-large bid to the tournament. Before the loss to the Gamecocks, Texas had an 82.3% chance. That’s quite a swing for one game. ESPN Analytics painted a similar picture for Texas’ tourney chances, knocking them down from a 67% chance to 52%.
The KenPom rankings, a close relative to the Torvik rankings, have Texas at No. 40. One thing the Longhorns have on their side is strength of schedule since they play in the toughest conference in America, the SEC. They have a No. 34 SOS rating, but in the end, they have to win more games to make that count. A road win in SEC play would certainly help.
For several weeks, ESPN’s Joe Lunardi has placed Texas in the “last four byes” category in his bracket projections. That means he considers the Longhorns one of the last four teams to make the field of 64 and not play in a First Four game. A new projection comes out Tuesday.
