Analysis: Is TCU in danger of falling on the wrong side of the NCAA tournament bubble?
March Madness is underway with a number of bids to the NCAA Tournament already secured at the mid-major level. Now it’s time for the Power conferences to join the mix.
It’s a week full of buzzer beaters, upsets and bid stealers as teams scrap and claw for one last shot to get into the NCAA Tournament.
After an upset loss to UCF on Saturday, there is understandable concern among the fan base that the Horned Frogs could now be one of these teams that need a Cinderella run to make it into the NCAA tournament field. Is that accurate?
Based on one final round of bracketology before the start of the Big 12 tournament, the projections still show TCU in good standing despite suffering its first bad loss of the season to the Knights.
ESPN analyst Joe Lunardi has the most popular bracket predictions and it’s the one fans are probably most familiar with. Lunardi’s bubble projections are divided into five sections: Last four byes, these are the teams that will avoid playing in a First Four game in Dayton. The next is last four in, followed by first four out, next four out and long shots in the final section.
There are four teams in each group for each region in the NCAA Tournament and the Horned Frogs are still in the last four byes section. If we ranked all 20 teams on Lunardi’s bubble 1-20 with one through eight being the teams in the field, TCU would currently be No. 3.
Six spots away from being on the wrong side of the bubble may sound worrisome, but it’s important to remember the bubble doesn’t operate like the AP Top 25. Aside from winning a conference tournament, it’ll be difficult for many of these teams to move up.
And the chaos that comes with March Madness is likely to impact the teams in the last four in category. Take for example what happened on Sunday when Drake upset Indiana State in the Missouri Valley Conference tournament final. The Bulldogs became a bid stealer and knocked Indiana State from comfortably in the field to the last four in, bumping No. 8 Villanova down to the first four out in Lunardi’s projection.
Indiana State isn’t a team in theory that should be able to jump TCU, even if the Horned Frogs lose to Oklahoma on Wednesday. Other teams in the category with Villanova (17-14, 10-10) include New Mexico (22-9, 10-8), Iowa (18-13, 10-10) and Texas A&M (18-13, 9-9).
These teams are competing more so against Indiana State, Colorado and St. John’s than they are the Horned Frogs. Could they jump TCU? Anything is possible as there’s always a human element to consider with the committee, but still all the numbers point to the Horned Frogs being in good shape.
BracketMatrix tracks nearly 100 bracket predictions from ESPN, Fox, CBS all the way down to more obscure analytics sites. TCU was in all 84 predictions tracked with many being updated after TCU’s loss to the Golden Knights.
TCU has fallen from a No. 8 seed in most predictions to a No. 9 or No. 10 seed like in CBS analyst Jerry Palm’s latest projections where he has the Horned Frogs as a No. 9 seed playing Florida Atlantic in Brooklyn.
The Horned Frogs are not a lock, their mistakes against UCF and BYU and countless other games eliminated that possibility before Wednesday, but unlike many teams on the bubble TCU controls its own destiny.
It would take a number of chaotic finishes in conference tournaments for TCU to really be in danger, but why tempt fate? Lunardi had one more section in his full preview, ‘Win and In’ with TCU being one of the four teams along with the Sooners that can lock up a bid with one victory.
So it’s pretty simple for TCU, take down the Sooners and take the pressure off its shoulders to continue to run in Kansas City or struggle to close again and spend the next four days in an agonizing wait.
It’s in the Horned Frogs’ hands now.
This story was originally published March 12, 2024 at 10:25 AM.
