Locks: Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, Kentucky, Texas A&M, Missouri
Work to do: Vanderbilt
Waiting Game: Auburn, Mississippi State
Vanderbilt (20-13, 11-7; NET: 82, SOS: 19): Vanderbilt refuses to go away. This is awesome. There is nothing quite as fun, to Bubble Watch, as a late, sudden, previously unforeseen bubble push. It’s the best, and Vanderbilt is doing its damndest to make it happen. Since the start of February, the ‘Dores are 9-1. They beat Tennessee at home, they upset Kentucky at Kentucky, and Friday, in the SEC tournament quarterfinals, Ezra Manjon led them to a huge win over Kentucky, continuing this team’s remarkable streak toward bubble relevance.
Vanderbilt’s continued bubble interest produced one of the great examples of home-conference-cooking network propaganda Friday night, too, in which the SEC Network folks found the worst part about several bubble teams’ resumes and showcased how Vanderbilt was better than all of them in those very specific and fundamentally unhelpful ways:
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https://t.co/MI8Qr5yduq pic.twitter.com/SpKsPKJiqp
— Eamonn Brennan (@eamonnbrennan) March 11, 2023
That’s not how this works. None of that is how this works! We assume that, like, even the most casual viewer understands, or even just assumes, that that’s not how things work. The whole resume matters. The whole thing. Vanderbilt might have better characteristics in various specific areas of their team sheet, but the whole thing is an interrelated matrix, a series of trade-offs. The Commodores have fully gotten themselves into the mix; they’ll get a long, hard look from the committee this weekend, regardless of what happens in the SEC tourney semis Saturday. But this idea — reiterated again at the end of the Kentucky win Friday night — that they just “punched their ticket”? Stop. Relax. Vanderbilt is making an incredible push, especially without star forward (and Davenport Assumption grad) Liam Robbins. Vanderbilt is doing everything it can. It doesn’t need the silly propaganda, we promise.
). But he’s been doing this for a very long time, so he remembers plenty of times when teams like ours didn’t get in. (For instance, I remember him listing our 2000 team with Dan Langhi as one of the worst oversights in NCAA tournament selection history.) So I think this is a good assessment of where we stand. Probably in, but the committee might prefer another team. Best way to be sure? Kick some Aggie bee-hinds, as we say in Texas.
