re: 2016 UGA Basketball Season Thread (20-14, 12-9) - Season Complete

To absolute hayell with Jeff Sheppard

and Ajayjay

We really need this one. It's a winnable road game, which our resume desperately needs.

Just projecting out, I view us needing 7 more wins to make the dance (I'm including SEC tourney). With six more wins we'd have a chance, but would need the teams we've already played to help us out with some RPI boosting wins.

If we close out 5-2 then win two in the SEC tourney I think we are in.

That's a tough path, but a win tonight keeps that as a reasonable possibility.

Bama and Vandy are kind of in our boat. Florida and Carolina, yes, tourney teams.

Bama is kind of like us: more than capable of doing some big things but, overall, just too inconsistent to count them in just yet.

They lost @OM worse than we did and lost to that horrendous Auburn team. Our game with them may be a win or go home type scenario relative to getting into the tourney

we are probably not going to make the tournament. my goal is to host an nit game or two. making the tournament would be fricking awesome but gonna need to beat florida or south carolina and take care of business with everyone else.

we are 82nd on kenpom fwiw with the 16th ranked defense. that typically falls pretty well outside the tournament field. if we were to beat florida and vanderbilt this week, we would jump into the top 60, maybe higher, on kenpom.

If we go 4-2 winning one of @Vandy and @SC plus win one SEC tourney game we would have a chance. Really though, we need to close out this stretch 5-1...incredibly unlikely but I've seen crazier things happen. Regardless, the next few weeks of basketball will be exciting.

According to Lunardi's latest bracketology Vandy is in the last 4 teams in while alabama is in the first 4 out. It appears both these teams are currently squarely on teh bubble which is where we want to be too. So how do we stack up with those teams?

Vandy
15-10 (7-5)
RPI 56
SOS 32
remaining schedule: very tough

Alabama
15-9 (6-6)
RPI 37
SOS 15
remaining schedule: tough but manageable

Georgia
14-9 (7-5)
RPI 67
SOS 33
remaining schedule: tough but manageable

They also have LSU as already solidly in, here is how they stack up

LSU
16-9 (9-3)
RPI 72
SOS 67
remaining schedule: pretty tough


I know there's roughly a 5% chance we make the tournament, but honestly we DO have A chance as of now. There's probably a tigher knit group in the SEC that's just ahead of us but we are right there below just a hair under. Our record doesn't look that great but our SOS is good and hopefully we can snag some solid RPI wins down the stretch.

quote:

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Honestly, we needed to pull out 1 or 2 of those games we had the lead and blew it late (Chatt and LSU). We also miss out on not playing 2 more winnable non-conference games...We would look a lot better being 16-9 right now or even 18-7 had we won 2 and also played 2 more easy non-con games.

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I've said it before but you absolutely can't think like that. For starters, anyone who has followed UGA basketball with any regularity doesnt' even want to think about that because it is beyond typical for the program. But more importantly, it's disingenuous because we have missouri and arkansas wins both by 1 possession that we easily could ahve lost. It's a long season, you lose your grip on some and you steal a few here and there. that's how it goes.

The good news is we have a shite at both Vandy and Bama coming up. Obviously those would be good wins, but they could serve as double duty in that they'd hurt a competing bubble team's chances.

We are favored by 1.5 points tomorrow vs. Florida. Huge huge game. Should be a packed house and loud.