Colorado University Athletics
Buffs Hope Bubble Doesn't Burst On Sunday, An In-Depth Look
November 28, 2015 | Volleyball
BOULDER – This is always the toughest time of the year for a team on the bubble. The time between your final regular season match and the NCAA selection show, not knowing if you'll have the opportunity to suit up at least more time. For many, not knowing if the last match was your last match, either of the season or of your career, can be overwhelming.
“I'm trying not to think about it,” senior Nicole Edelman said shortly after playing her final match at the Coors Events Center Friday afternoon. “I would drive myself crazy. But I think we've done everything we can do. We controlled what we can control, now it's just a waiting game.”
What did the Buffs do? What could they have done better? What are their chances? They will find out Sunday night with the selection show slated for 7 p.m. MT and aired live on ESPNU.
“It's still a huge question mark,” CU coach Liz Krizta said after Friday's win over Utah. “It will be until the brackets come out on Sunday night.”
The main reason the Buffs are even on the bubble is the RPI. Prior to the final week of action, the Buffs were No. 66 in the RPI. If that were, alone, the only measure, the Buffs wouldn't have a chance of making the tournament. It is a factor, no doubt, but after doing an in-depth look, it will all come down to one key, unknown, factor: Exactly how much will the selection committee weigh the RPI will determine the Buffs fate. Every other way there is to measure success, the Buffs are one of the top 64 teams in the country.
“The RPI is an interesting thing,” Kritza explained. “I've coached teams who have benefited from it and teams that have not benefited from it. What we as coaches do is count on the selection committee to put together a tournament that showcases the best volleyball in the country. If they do that, I'm very confident.”
The Buffs are receiving votes as a ranked team in the AVCA Coaches Poll, No. 30 if you expanded out the Top 25. In Rich Kern's poll, the Buffs are ranked No. 24. In the Pablo Rankings, the “other” computer rankings for the sport, the Buffs are No. 35. If those numbers are looked at equally to the others, the Buffs have a solid chance of continuing their season.
“The RPI is the one that's more publicly talked about, but the Pablo Ranking in many ways is a much more accurate representation,” Krizta said. “It doesn't just count wins and losses, it counts set wins, home and away and relative scores. People in the volleyball community, including those on the selection committee, they understand the Pablo rankings and they look at it, as well.”
The only asterisk to any of this is that all the rankings are through matches of last week. The Buffs did win both matches this past week, albeit against teams near the bottom of the Pac-12 standings, but a win is a win and it shouldn't affect things too much, it just may not help much, either.
The mathematics of it are this: There are 64 teams that make the NCAA Tournament. There are 32 conferences that play Division I volleyball and every conference champion gets an automatic berth into the tournament field. That leaves 32 at-large selections for those who don't win their conference.
As of Friday night, 30 of the 32 conferences nationally had either crowned its regular season champion or completed its conference tournament. Those automatically in the tournament at this point are: American (Patriot), Arkansas State (Sun Belt), Belmont (Ohio Valley), BYU (West Coast), Cleveland State (Horizon), Coastal Carolina (Big South), Colorado State (Mountain West), Dayton (Atlantic-10), Denver (Summit), Fairfield (MAAC), Furman (Southern), Harvard (Ivy League), Hawai'i (Big West), Howard (MEAC), Jackson State (SWAC), Lipscomb (Atlantic Sun), Louisville (ACC), Minnesota (Big Ten), New Hampshire (America East), New Mexico State (WAC), North Carolina-Wilmington (CAA), Northern Arizona (Big Sky), Ohio (MAC), Robert Morris (Northeast), Southern California (Pac-12), Southern Methodist (American), Texas (Big 12), Texas A&M (SEC), Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (Southland) and Western Kentucky (CUSA).
The Big East (Creighton vs. Villanova) and Missouri Valley (Wichita State vs. Missouri State) tournament championships will take place Saturday. Those are the 32 locks, now to the 32 at-large selections. It's likely that at least 18 of the 32 conference are one-bid leagues, glancing at both RPI and Pablo rankings through last week.
For those 32 at-large sections, there are a good number of what should be locks, teams ranked highly in both computer polls and both human polls. Those teams are Florida (SEC), Florida State (ACC), Kansas (Big 12), Illinois (Big Ten), Iowa State (Big 12), Kentucky (SEC), Missouri (SEC), Nebraska (Big Ten), North Carolina (ACC), Ohio State (Big Ten), Penn State (Big Ten), Purdue (Big Ten), San Diego (West Coast), Stanford (Pac-12), UCLA (Pac-12), Washington (Pac-12) and Wisconsin (Big Ten).
Those 17 locks leave 15 spots left. Of the remaining teams, there are six that are ranked in the top 30 in either the RPI or Pablo rankings, those are Arizona (Pac-12), Arizona State (Pac-12), Loyola Marymount (West Coast), Michigan (Big Ten), Oregon (Pac-12) and Santa Clara (West Coast).
If Creighton wins the Big East and Wichita State wins the Missouri Valley titles, that would likely help the Buffs as both of those leagues could also be one-bid leagues. Should Creighton fall in the Big East Championship or Wichita State in the MVC, they both would likely still make the tournament as an at-large team, and could take two more spots away from the teams really on the bubble. The difference being leaving either seven or nine spots for the teams listed below with both RPI and Pablo rankings included.
Thus, the bubble likely consists of: Baylor (49 RPI/65 Pablo), Boise State (45/41), Colorado (66/35), Kansas State (44/36), Long Beach State (63/40), Marquette (36/62), Miami (38/47), Michigan State (58/39), Missouri State (40/58), Northwestern (42/48), Pacific (60/42), Pittsburgh (47/49), Southern Illinois (39/63), Syracuse (61/46), TCU (46/42), Villanova (43/68), Virginia (54/60) and Wyoming (48/55).
Of those 18 teams, remember we're talking about only seven or nine spots remaining, the Buffs are joined by Kansas State, Marquette, Miami, Michigan State and Southern Illinois as the seven teams that are ranked in the top 40 in one of the two computer rankings.
Why exactly will it come down to how much weight is put on either computer poll? Of those seven teams listed, the Buffs Pablo ranking of No. 35 is the best of the bunch, but the Buffs RPI of No. 66 is the worst of the bunch.
If the selection committee even just uses those rankings as a method to determine the bubble teams to do more research, the Buffs should benefit from some other factors:
- Big Wins vs. Bad Losses: In the latest Pablo rankings, the Buffs did not lose to a team outside the top 100 (out of 334 teams nationally) and CU had just two losses to teams ranked lower than No. 30. The Buffs had six wins over teams ranked in the top 28 in the latest Pablo rankings, including No. 8 Stanford.
- Taking sets off highly ranked teams: The Buffs took USC, ranked No. 1 by humans and No. 2 by both computers, to five sets in Boulder. The Trojans lost just one match all year, and the Buffs won sets 1 and 3 and had set point in the second, just one point away from sweeping the Trojans before they came back to take the match in five. The Buffs also took a set off the Trojans in LA later in the season and took a set off the Cardinal in Palo Alto, as well. The Buffs were swept just five times all season, all to teams ranked in the top 11.
- Winning Conference Record: Should Arizona, Arizona State and Oregon make the tournament that would mean three teams BELOW the Buffs in the Pac-12 standings will make it. CU finished with a 11-9 league record, better than the Ducks (10-10), the Wildcats (9-11) and the Sun Devils (8-12). And, oh yeah, the Buffs finished a combined 4-2 against those three teams this season. Who knows how much league standings come into play, but it's hard to imagine the No. 5 team in the Pac-12 not making and then the Nos. 6, 7 and 8 teams making it.
- Strong Finish: It's never a given if the selection committee actually looks at how a team finished the season, but if they do, they'll see a 5-1 record in the last six matches for CU, with that one loss at Stanford, and a 9-5 mark in the final 14 matches with four of those five losses coming to teams ranked No. 11 or higher (the other was No. 28).
What more can the Buffs do? Nothing. “We've done all we can do,” junior Cierra Simpson said. “Now we leave it up to the selection committee and hope for the best.”
“The selection committee will do their job and if they look at everything they should, I'm confident we haven't seen these seniors play their final match,” Kritza said. “The players jobs are done now, they need to relax and prepare for a really strong tournament run. It's my job to worry about the next 48 hours.”
