2011 NCAA Tournament Bubble Watch: St. Mary's And The Bracket Projection Matrix

The St. Mary’s Gaels wrapped up their 2011 WCC regular season schedule yesterday, notching a win over the Portland Pilots to finish the regular season 23-7. The victory secured the number one seed for Saint Mary’s in the WCC postseason tournament, although they will still be sharing the regular season conference title with the Bulldogs. With the 2011 NCAA Tournament approaching in a couple weeks, the three-game losing streak might have pushed the Gaels into a bubble watch position where they have to win the conference tournament to go dancing in late March.

At this point bracket projections are just educated guesses. People making projections don’t know what’s going through the heads of the selection committee as they make these projections, so there is some subjective feel to the brackets. However, the more brackets we can find, the more we might be able to get a better idea of where a team is going to end up.

A group called The Bracket Project has spent this year doing the necessary legwork to put together a database of numerous such bracket projections. At last count, The 2011 Bracket Matrix has compiled 71 different brackets from across the Internet. Some are a bit more “respected” than others, but at the end of the day it’s all somewhat subjective guessing.

Following this weekend’s action, Saint Mary’s is projected at the bottom of the 11 line. They are currently appearing in 67 of the 71 brackets with a high seed of 9 and a low seed of 13. The four brackets to not include the Gaels are Shelby’s Bracket W.A.G., the Daily Bracket, Hoopville, and Ryan Bracketology.