the shrewdness of apes

sitting here watching Duke-Clemson, with the NCAA tournament a scant 3 weeks away (and with a full month or so before baseball really starts to matter), it seems like a good idea to start talking some college hoops.

over the past 3 months, i've been lucky enough to participate in an poll conducted Dan Steinberg of the Washington Post, the author of the D.C. Sports Bog, to rank the top 11 teams in MD/DC/VA. and by lucky, i mean "Dan knows me and asked for volunteers for the poll with little regard to actual qualifications other than being willing to fill out a ballot every week and toss off some one liners." little did i know that some of my one liners would actually end up in the print edition of the Post on Tuesdays (the poll posts online on Mondays). you can find the most recent poll here and you can read a host of comments from poll voters here (including a pretty awful but amusing comment by me about a week before Barbaro died).

point being, i've been paying a lot of attention to college basketball this season and though there are probably 10,000 other blogs breaking things down, i'm going to do some analysis of my own of each conference that has a chance to get mutliple teams into the field of 65. first a couple of links:

Bubblewatch at ESPN.com
Ken Pomeroy's Rankings (which go way beyond RPI)

Atlantic Coast Conference
Even in this era of mid-major hoopla, the ACC is always a threat to send 8 teams to the NCAA tournament and this year is no different. Pomeroy, for instance, has 9 ACC teams in his top 48. But conference records are a zero sum game and the selection committee has always been loathe to let teams with sub-.500 conference records into the tourney. This is especially bad news for Clemson, who has now lost at home to Duke tonight, making them 5-8 in the ACC and just 2-8 in their last 10 games after starting 17-0. And they're not the only streaky team here. Virginia, Maryland, Virginia Tech, Duke, Georgia Tech and Florida St. have all had bad sreaks at various times.

No Shot in Hell: Miami (Fl.), N.C. State, Wake Forest
Dying On the Vine: Clemson, Florida St., Boston College
As mentioned above, the Tigers are fading faster than a newspaper left out in the sun. Losers of 5 in a row since a win at Duke during the Blue Devils flashback to 1995, Florida St. will have to use their win over Florida to comfort them during the NIT. B.C. was in first place in the conference at 9-2, but have lost three in a row and 5 out of 9 in conference, and their non-conference schedule wasn't exactly formidable (hello Sacred Heart, Yale, Hartford, Fairfield, and a loss to Vermont). They looked positively putrid last night against Virginia Tech.
The Creamy Middles: Virginia Tech, Virginia, Maryland, Georgia Tech
Va. Tech has spent the season alternating between huge wins over Duke, UNC and Virginia with losses to the likes of N.C. State (twice), Marshall and Western Michigan. Virginia had a terrible trip to Puerto Rico in December, losing to Appalachain St (not a bad team, as it turns out), Utah, and barely holding off Puerto Rico-Mayaguez. After a win over Gonzaga, they lost 3 in a row to Stanford, UNC and BC, then won 7 in a row and have since been demolished by Va. Tech and lost to Miami in the past 2 weeks. Maryland was swept by Virginia and sitting at 3-6 in the ACC before reeling off 4 in a row and putting themselves in much better position since they only have 1 blemish loss to Miami. Georgia Tech is another streaky team with a sub .500 conference record but several good non-conference wins (Memphis, Purdue, Georgia). They need to finish strong.
Shoe-ins: North Carolina, Duke
UNC has been in the top 5 all season and is a contender for a 1 seed. Duke got written off during their 4-game losing streak, but they're Satan's spawn and every pundit's wet dream. OK, and they have plenty of good wins over solid opponents.
TSOA's Picks: This is somewhat obvious based on the categories, but i'll take UNC, Duke, Va. Tech, Virginia, Maryland and the winner of the BC/Ga. Tech game on March 4th (I'm picking the Yellow Jackets).

Up next: Atlantic 10, Big East, Big South