Not that this is surprising news, but a look at the NCAA's latest RPI men's basketball figures shows the Big West Conference will be a one-bid league to the 65-team NCAA Tournament again this season. This also means the team that wins the regular season is assured of nothing, and the champion of the Big West Tournament could receive a very low seed.
As of Feb. 25, ESPN's Joe Lunardi projects Cal State Northridge will win the Big West Tournament and earn a 14th seed to the NCAA Tournament, opening against third-seeded Stanford.
But even a 14th seed might be too high for the Big West this year considering the league does not have a team ranked in the top 85 of the latest RPI, with UCSB leading the way at No. 89. Cal Poly is down to No. 209:
BIG WEST RPI
- 89. UCSB
- 93. CS Fullerton
- 116. CS Northridge
- 129. Pacific
- 184. UC Irvine
- 209. Cal Poly
- 296. UC Riverside
- 300. UC Davis
- 319. Long Beach St.
3 comments:
WEAK -- this is the only comment on the last couple of basketball blogs. It is obvious that pretty much the only blogs that Brian posts that receive any comments from the readers are the football posts. I have to believe that that is the reason that we don't see more comments from Brian regarding the other sports. Football is the engine that pulls along all of the other sports at Cal Poly...
Thanks for the blogs. While I read The Tribune each morning, the blogs fill out the story. Keep them up.
The lack of strength of the Big West is what makes Cal Poly's basketball stuggles all the more frustrating. If you could put together even a halfway decent program, one could challenge for a NCAA Tournament spot each year. However, at Poly, the team makes a run only once every few years. There is NO consistently with this program. Actually, I guess, there is. The consistently unfortunately is continuous mediocrity. And even more frustrating perhaps is that every time this team has high expectations (like this season), for whatever reason they end up disappointing. It's interesting that both seasons where the team has followed trips to the Big West championship games have been monumental disappointments. Just like in 2004, this year's team has failed to meet expectations despite returning 11 players (most in the conference). Anyway, back to the point. The Big West is seemingly always there for the taking now that Utah St. is gone, but unfortunately, Cal Poly always seems to be spinning its wheels.
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