ESPN Men's Basketball

In its own way, every offseason trip taken by college basketball programs -- in which a coach and his players go overseas for weeks at a time, bonding and chalking up early practice allowed by the NCAA -- is special.

College basketball players don't get much time (or, you know, money) with which they can take the customary collegiate trip to a foreign country. They don't have the opportunity to study abroad. So when teams go to Italy or Ireland or China, the trip is special. It's a unique experience. I am always jealous. (Although, much as I want to visit China, I am glad I was not with the Georgetown Hoyas last summer. That fight looked terrifying.)

But even by the very cool standards of most foreign trips, what Lorenzo Romar has planned for his Washington Huskies sounds especially neat. Washington will travel for two weeks, making stops in Spain, France and Monaco, which, OK, Eamonn's already jealous again. Monaco? Awesome. But even better -- the last leg of the trip is Senegal, homeland of senior forward Aziz N'Diaye. From the Tacoma News-Tribune:

The Huskies will play a game in Dakar Senegal. But they will also host and take part in several basketball camps and clinics as part of World Vision’s Area Development Program.

“You do home visits with kids when you are recruiting them and you meet parents and have an opportunity to see their world,” Romar said. “In this case, we not only get to see Aziz’s world, but his family and friends get to see the group he has been living with the last couple of years.”

It's a nice touch from Romar, who usually tries to schedule a game in the hometown of seniors. That's not possible for N'Diaye during the regular season, obviously, but the solution Romar found is an awfully nice one.

Note to my bosses: We should definitely be covering this trip! I'll submit my travel request soon. What's that? I'm not going? Well, it was worth a shot.

1. Baylor coach Scott Drew said an NBA draft early-entry decision from Perry Jones III and Quincy Miller will come at some point this week after he sits down and meets with the families. If both were to return then the Bears would be one of the favorites again in the Big 12 and possibly a Final Four.

2. Washington coach Lorenzo Romar said Tony Wroten Jr., would likely make up his mind sometime this week, as well. The Huskies lost Terrence Ross to the NBA Sunday when he officially declared for the draft. The Huskies underachieved this season by failing to reach the NCAA tournament despite winning the Pac-12 regular-season title.

3. Mississippi State pulled a sleeper out of the coaching carousel when they hired Clemson associate head coach Rick Ray. This was a stunner. But it also shows how difficult a time it is for these schools to lure a high-major coach away from another significant gig, let alone a head coach who is comfortable at a conference outside the power six. Times have changed in coaching as more coaches are content to stay put if they’re winning, compensated well, and have a chance to make the NCAA tournament.

The NCAA field of 68 is out and there are plenty of storylines. Let’s take a snapshot look at some of the most interesting nuggets that we compiled today.

On the seedings

• This is the fourth time Tom Izzo has had a team that is a No. 1 seed. The three previous times, he reached the Final Four (1999-2001). In all, Michigan State has been a No. 1 seed five times (also in 1990)
• This is the sixth time that Texas has been a double-digit seed in the men's basketball championship. Each of the previous five times, the Longhorns won at least one game in the NCAA tournament.

• This is the 1st time since 1992 that Connecticut has been seeded ninth or worse in the tournament (No. 9 seed in 1992). The Huskies had played in 14 tournaments since then seeded eighth or better.

Next Level

• Six of the top 12 teams in tempo (possessions per game) in the NCAA tournament are in the West Region. Brigham Young and Iona play in the first round. Seven teams that led their conference in transition points per game are in that region (Michigan State, Missouri, Marquette, Murray State, Memphis, and Iona).
• Creighton's matchup with Alabama in the Midwest Region will be a contrast between offensive and defensive efficiency. Creighton averages 117.8 points per 100 possessions, which is second in the nation, while Alabama allows 91.4 points per 100 possessions, which is second in the SEC and 16th in the nation.
• Virginia Commonwealth forces a turnover on 27.4 percent of its possessions and forces 17.9 turnovers per game this season, both of which are first in the nation. The Rams average 20.4 points per game off turnovers, which is identical to the number of points per game off turnovers that Syracuse scores this season. Syracuse is first among power six conference teams in points per game off turnovers.

• Florida averages 1.16 points per possession this season (tied for-fourth-highest in nation); Virginia allows 0.88 points per possession (second-lowest in nation).

Obscurity

• There are 31 states (and Washington DC) represented in the NCAA tournament. North Carolina has the most teams in the field (North Carolina, Duke, NC State, UNC-Asheville and Davidson). The state of Kentucky went 4-for-6 in getting teams into the field.
• Nashville and Cincinnati are the only two cities with a pair of NCAA tournament teams. Nashville has Belmont and Vanderbilt. Cincinnati has Xavier and the University of Cincinnati.
• The most common nickname in the tournament is Wildcats. It is represented by Kentucky, Kansas State, and Davidson. Also of note: Both teams nicknamed Gaels (Iona and Saint Mary’s) are in the field.

Snubs

• Washington became the first regular-season conference champion from a Power Six conference to not be selected to the NCAA tournament field. The Huskies 14 conference wins are the most of any Power Six team to miss the tournament since the field expanded to 64 teams in 1985.
• Drexel and Oral Roberts each won 27 games, tied for the second-most by a team that didn’t make the tournament field, since it expanded to 64 teams, one behind Coastal Carolina (28 wins in 2010-11).
• Marshall had the best RPI for a team that didn’t make the NCAA tournament-- 43.

Here are my quick initial thoughts on the 2012 NCAA tournament bracket:

• By going South (Atlanta), Kentucky was protected from a potential Elite Eight game in the Midwest (St. Louis) against Kansas. Wonder whether the Wildcats would have traded that for the chance to avoid Connecticut in a very likely third-round matchup.
• The price for "protecting" Kentucky is having North Carolina top the Midwest instead of the South, forcing both the Wildcats (by a little) and the Tar Heels (by a lot) into additional travel.
• Kansas was apparently ahead of Missouri on the committee's S-curve, as the Jayhawks got a more favorable No. 2 seed than the Tigers. Either way, I am glad the committee stayed at it long enough to award Michigan State (rightfully so) the final No. 1 seed.
• I thought for a moment that Colorado's relatively good seed (No. 11) might be a good sign for California or even Washington. Not so much. The Bears get an early-week trip to Dayton, and the Huskies become the first regular-season "big six" champion to miss the NCAA tournament.
• I'm guessing the somewhat surprising slot for the BYU-Iona winner (No. 14, West) might have something to do with BYU's "no Sunday play" rule. Either way, it is the worst at-large seed I can ever recall.
• I can totally understand the choice of Iona and applaud it. My guess is Drexel was ultimately done in, as expected, by its weak schedule-strength numbers. We might never know which team was ultimately knocked out by St. Bonaventure's winning the Atlantic 10 championship.
• Overall, my favorite thing about this year's field is that -- intentionally or not -- the "Joey Brackets Rule" is in effect for the most part. There was only one (UConn) at-large selection of a team under .500 in conference play. Bravo to that.

Say this for the NCAA: When it expanded the tournament to 68 teams, it accomplished at least one thing.

It made your argument invalid.

Once the province of outrage and disgust, the post-tournament bracket digestion process has become downright serene. It was difficult to gin up much outrage over 2011's tournament "snubs," and you'll have to stretch even harder to get there in 2012. This bubble was soft. It was really, really soft.

The opportunities were there. If your favorite high-major team didn't make the tournament, it's probably because it missed numerous chances for big wins. If your mid-major squad didn't get in, it's probably because its league was bad and it didn't prove anything outside conference play. If you're from the Pac-12 ... well, again: Nicolas Cage's hair is a bird, and your argument is invalid.

It's hard to feel much sympathy for any of these teams. If your team was good, it would have gotten in the field. If it didn't, it wasn't. Simple enough.

That said, the bubble is always a matter of relativity. And relatively speaking, a handful of teams will be able to lodge legitimate complaints against the 2012 NCAA tournament selection committee. These are their stories:

Drexel Dragons (27-6, 16-2 CAA; RPI: 64; SOS: 248)

What the committee would say: We liked Drexel's dominance in the Colonial -- we couldn't easily discount a team that won 25 of its final 27 games -- but whom did Drexel beat, exactly? The Colonial was down this season. No one in the league got a good nonconference win. Drexel got both VCU and George Mason at home (and didn't have to go on the road), and its atrocious scheduling numbers put a major dent in all those wins. Drexel was good in the CAA tournament final, but so were a lot of teams, and we don't look at margin of victory. We wish we could put them in, but we just can't do it.

What fans would say: Dudes. Dudes! Put down the nitty-gritty sheets, toss aside your dumb schedule-strength metrics and RPI nonsense, briefly come up for air, and then ask yourself: What bubble team played better basketball in the final two months of the season than Drexel? Just because the Dragons can't get the same number of games against top-50 teams doesn't mean you shouldn't reward them for beating the teams on their schedule. Sure, the entire body of work matters, but what about the win at Cleveland State? What about that 25-2 record since early December? (25-2!) Plus, the only bad losses this team took all happened four months ago. Strength of schedule is a joke, and so are you.

Also ... you put in Iona and not Drexel? What? How does that make any sense? Explain yourselves! (You can't. Ugh.)

Mississippi State Bulldogs (21-11, 8-8 SEC; RPI: 73; SOS: 87)

What the committee would say: We care about the entire body of work. We really do. But we also reserve the right to evaluate a team as it currently is, not as it was earlier in the season, and the bottom line is this: The Bulldogs collapsed down the stretch. MSU lost six of its final eight games, including two games to Georgia, one to LSU and one to Auburn. We watch teams play, and when we watched Rick Stansbury's, we saw a disjointed, disinterested bunch who looked ripe for early upset. Besides, it's not like the body of work is overwhelming. MSU has two good wins -- over Alabama and at Vanderbilt -- and really not much else. And that 73 RPI? Yeah, that's not good.

What the fans would say: Oh ... it ... we ... we have no response. That was perfect.

Washington Huskies (21-10, 14-4 Pac-12; RPI: 70; SOS: 94)

What the committee would say: This team went 7-6 in the nonconference, and its best win came at home against UC-Santa Barbara. Its best overall win came against either Oregon or Arizona. It lost by 19 at home to South Dakota State. Sure, it won its league, but so what? The Pac-12 went 1-29 in nonconference play against the RPI top 50 this season, and if Washington was so good -- or at least as good as its obvious talent -- it would have dominated that league and made an emphatic statement in the Pac-12 tourney. Instead, it lost to Oregon State. No sympathy here.

What fans would say: East Coast bias! OK, maybe not: We admit the Pac-12 was really bad. But UW did win the league, and no power-conference regular-season champion has ever missed the NCAA tournament. Plus, before you go ripping on UW's nonconference performance, please account for the fact that it narrowly lost to Duke and Marquette in a matter of days on the East Coast in early December. If you've seen this team play, you know it can make a deep tournament run. Isn't that worth something? (Answer: No. But UW fans seem to keep making this argument anyway.)

Seton Hall Pirates (20-12, 8-10 Big East; RPI: 61; SOS: 57)

What the committee would say: Seton Hall had as many chances as any bubble team in the country to get the wins it needed to impress us. With just minimal exception, the Pirates didn't. Sure, they crushed Georgetown on Feb. 21, but that win came in the midst of a 5-10 overall finish and was mixed in with missed opportunities against beatable opportunities like Notre Dame, Louisville, UConn and Cincinnati. Throw that in with a nonconference schedule that included a loss to Northwestern and no good wins, and the impression remains: The Pirates had a decent season, but they just didn't do enough.

What the fans would say: Few bubble teams have even one RPI top-50 win. Seton Hall has four. It also won at Dayton and beat West Virginia, which, OK, that's not crazy impressive, but no one's arguing the Pirates should be a single-digit seed -- just that they're more deserving than most of the bubble for one of those last at-large spots.

Northwestern Wildcats (18-13, 8-10 Big Ten; RPI: 59; SOS: 15)

What the committee would say: How many opportunities do you need? You got 11 cracks at top-50 wins. You won one of them. That's really all you need to know. We respect the strength of schedule, but it had more to do with your conference than your nonconference, and your chief nonconference wins came over Seton Hall and LSU. OK? Bottom line: Northwestern proved it was a very average team that could beat the teams it was supposed to beat but couldn't get over the hump against the kind of teams you need to beat to prove you belong. We feel for you, Northwestern fans, but you really didn't belong.

What the fans would say: [Play Morrissey's "How Soon Is Now?", throw remote control across the wall, decide to stop caring about basketball forever.]

Andy Katz recaps an action-packed Champ Week Thursday in college basketball.

Oregon State had one of the Pac-12's best nonconference wins.

And it was over a middling, young Texas team in overtime in New Jersey.

But that sort of summed up the Pac-12. The league was light on nonconference wins and when its teams got into league play, beating each other up only enhanced the perception that the conference wasn’t worthy of elite status.

Well, heading into Friday night’s semifinals, Oregon State has the best win of the Pac-12 tournament too, knocking off top-seeded regular-season champ Washington 86-84 on Thursday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

“It’s my best win ever, as a coach or as a player when I was at Princeton,’’ Oregon State coach Craig Robinson said late Thursday night by phone. “This team is starting to believe that they’re as good as we thought they were. It’s really nice to see. This is a watershed moment for these guys. Those guys on Washington are really good.’’

The Beavers (19-13) move into the Pac-12 semifinals against Arizona. Oregon State isn’t on the bubble. Arizona is probably a reach, or at least third in line for a possible bid among Washington and Cal on the at-large candidacy list.

Washington, even with the Pac-12 regular-season title, must now sweat out Selection Sunday.

The Huskies’ nonconference resume has nothing to shout about. The worst home loss -- a blowout to South Dakota State -- might look better now that the Jackrabbits won the Summit League title. But that’s still a team from the Summit going into Seattle and cleaning house.

“I’m not in there in the committee,’’ UW coach Lorenzo Romar said during the postgame news conference. “I know we haven’t won as many games as we should have in nonconference as a league. I would think the Pac-12 champion would be able to find a place in the NCAA tournament. We certainly didn’t help ourselves, but I would think we’d be able to find ourselves in there.

“But I am not on the committee. The committee, they’re meeting, and we’re kind of at the mercy of their decision.’’

As for the Beavers, their defense has tightened up in the two Pac-12 tourney games so far, coming back to beat Washington State and Washington on consecutive nights.

The offense is more than capable of beating Arizona and advancing to the title game if Jared Cunningham, Devon Collier and Ahmad Starks make sound decisions.

“These guys are starting to trust each other,’’ Robinson said. “We were hoping that we could play well in the first game. The way we started to come out I thought we could win.’’

In their one meeting this season, Arizona beat Oregon State in overtime in Tucson. There was a minor scuffle at the end of the game. But there is too much on the line in this one to expect any carryover to Friday.

“I like the fact that we lost to them in overtime,’’ Robinson said. “That bodes well for us psychologically. I like our offense. We haven’t had trouble scoring in either game. But it will come down to whether or not we defend well.’’

Oregon State looked like it had floundered a few weeks ago, losing five in a row. But the Beavers then rallied to sweep a homestand with Utah and Colorado heading into the 8-9 game against the Cougars.

“That gave us some momentum,’’ Robinson said. “You sometimes see with veteran teams they’ll play well in a tournament, but we’re doing it with a bunch of freshmen and sophomores and it took them a little while to figure it all out.’’

Andy Katz gives his take on five games he's looking forward to on Thursday, including a pair of stellar matchups in the Big 12 and a couple of bubble teams in need of a win.

Doug Gottlieb goes conference by conference to examine what each bubble team needs to do this week to feel at least somewhat safe. To read Eamonn Brennan's updated Bubble Watch, click here.

Believe it or not, a certain massive matchup in Durham, N.C., isn't the only college hoops game on the schedule today. Hard to believe, I know, but it's true.

Here's a look at much of the action -- bubble and otherwise -- that served as the appetizer to tonight's main course. Be sure to check back later this evening for our writers' reactions and analysis from across the country.

No. 7 Marquette 83, No. 12 Georgetown 69: When March calms down, and the offseason finishes out its usual assortment of draft decisions, coaching intrigue and off-campus arrests (and everything else), I'm going to sit down one week and calculate college hoops winning percentages on senior night. With the exception of Northwestern (which lost in heartbreaking fashion Wednesday), it felt like nearly every team in the country won its final home game of the season this week. A lot of that is just good, old-fashioned home-court advantage, and some of it is skill and so forth, but when you strip all that away, I'm still going to guess pretty much every college hoops team in the country sees a massive bounce in its winning in the final home game of the season. Quantifying emotion is never easy. This feels like a chance.

In any case, Marquette followed this (presumably real, potentially imagined) trend Saturday, easily handling a Georgetown team that was itself coming off a dominant performance in its final home game of the season, a 59-41 victory over Notre Dame. In doing so, the Golden Eagles extended their Big East record to 14-4 and ensured the No. 2 seed in the Big East tournament next week. Meanwhile, Jae Crowder made one last-ditch pitch for Big East player of the year: He scored 26 points and grabbed 14 rebounds on 8-of-15 from the field and 10-of-12 from the free throw line. (Crowder missed all five 3-point attempts, a portion of his game that he's really improved this season. When your center can shoot 37 percent from 3-point range, you've got a very difficult team to guard.)

Can Crowder win the award? Because he should. With all due respect to Darius Johnson-Odom and like four or five different Syracuse players, Crowder's mix of offensive efficiency (offensive rating: 122.9; including 61 percent from inside the arc, a low turnover rate, and the aforementioned perimeter solidity), rebounding and defense (he's averaging 2.3 steals and 1.0 blocks per game) make him, to me, the most complete, most important player in the conference.

No. 9 Murray State 54, Tennessee State 52 (Ohio Valley Championship): With six minutes left in the OVC title game, bubble teams across the country were no doubt finding it difficult to establish regulated breathing patterns. Tennessee State was up 48-43, the Racers were struggling to find stops against the dish-and-kick action of the Tigers' 1-4 low sets, and even worse, Isaiah Canaan, Murray State's do-it-all star, was battling through an off night. A two-bid OVC -- and a suddenly shrunken bubble -- were very real possibilities.

But Murray State locked in on defense, stacking great possession after great possession, cutting the Tigers off and preventing easy shots in the paint, and eventually came back to seal the win. The final go-ahead basket was a matter of immediate controversy at the broadcast table; our own Fran Fraschilla was convinced Murray State guard Jewuan Long charged on his game-winning basket. The call was close, no question. But all due respect to Fran, who is way better than this than I am, I disagree that it should have been a charge. A few things here. Long shot the ball before contact was initiated; the defender was still slightly sliding under the move, rather than entirely in front of it; and, most importantly, it was the penultimate play of a one-possession game with the NCAA tournament on the line. The ref needs to swallow his whistle there. And, in general, college coaches and players -- frankly, this applies to the NBA, too -- need to stop coaching defense like this! It's bad for the sport. There are plenty of ways to defend a driving player without fouling or attempt to draw a foul. Choose one. Don't run to a spot and hope the ref gives you the benefit of a 50-50 call, especially when your season is on the line. In short: Play defense.

Maybe that's the pickup player in me coming out; I would have little sympathy even if Long committed a blatant charge. But it wasn't. The no-call couldn't have been more appropriate. And every bubble team in the country can breathe just a little bit easier as a result.

Illinois State 65, No. 14 Wichita State 64: On second thought, bubble teams, you can go back to freaking out now. Why? Because Arch Madness has yielded its first truly mad result of the tournament. Wichita State is the Missouri Valley's best team and No. 1 overall seed, not to mention everyone's pick to be this year's mid-major tournament darling. But that didn't stop the Redbirds -- thanks to Tyler Brown's two clutch free throws and two misses in the last six seconds from WSU's Toure' Murry and Garrett Stutz -- from shocking the Shockers all the same. (Sorry. Couldn't resist.)

Wichita State doesn't have much to worry about in the way of its NCAA tournament seed, of course. But every team along the bubble line, including many of those mentioned below, should be terrified. If Creighton suffers the same fate at any point this weekend, the Missouri Valley will send three teams to the NCAA tournament and steal one bid from a bubble that is destined to shrink even further down the stretch.

Could that third team be Illinois State? Why not? When you beat Wichita State on a neutral court, you deserve the benefit of the doubt.

No. 2 Syracuse 58, No. 18 Louisville 49: This was always an uphill battle for Louisville for one obvious reason: The Cardinals can't score. Louisville can defend. It can rebound. It can get stops when it needs them. But when you have the Big East's 11th-best offense on a per-possession basis, when your effective field-goal percentage ranks outside the nation's top 200 teams, when you turn the ball over on 21.8 percent of your possessions (national rank: No. 241) and your task is to break down Syracuse's smothering 2-3 defense in the Carrier Dome, well, good luck. Syracuse played its typically potent brand of extended defense, forcing Louisville a downright awful 2-of-23 mark from beyond the arc, and that's pretty much your game right there.

It's going to be interesting to see how Rick Pitino tries to adjust this team as he heads toward the NCAA tournament. A few weeks ago, Pitino told ESPN Radio's Scott Van Pelt that he liked to speed the game up and take more risks in the tournament; in his experience, too many coaches slow down in the tournament, fearing disorganization and disarray. This might be his only course of action in March. The Cardinals can't find any offense, but they can press and trap and slap and claw and hope to get easy buckets from turnovers and bad shots in transition. At this point, with this anemic, predictable offense (prediction: Peyton Siva won't see a defense guard him over the top on another ball screen all season), does Pitino have any other choice?

Variously Questionable Bubble Losses

West Virginia 50, South Florida 44: The Mountaineers desperately needed this win. Before this week's victory over DePaul, WVU had lost seven of its previous nine games and seen its once-certain at-large tournament bid -- WVU was once a No. 5 seed in Joe Lunardi's bracket; now it's a No. 12 -- become an entirely precarious matter. This win obviously helps, and not just because it was a win: It also put a ding on one of WVU's potential bubble rivals, South Florida, which has surged into the bubble conversation in recent weeks thanks to a gaudy Big East record and consecutive victories over Cincinnati and Louisville. A win Saturday might have put the Bulls on the right side of the bubble in official fashion. As it is, their profile still looks much better than it used to, but with a 5-10 road record and a 2-8 mark against the RPI top 50, some positive results in the Big East tournament may well be necessary.

UCLA 75, Washington 69: First things first: This was a really nice win for UCLA. It hasn't been the easiest week for the Bruins (that's a candidate for understatement of the year), but with back-to-back good wins (a blowout of Washington State and this plucky victory over the league's standings leader) at least they finished on a positive note. As for Washington, the loss might well have cost the Huskies the outright Pac-12 title. Cal still needs to win get a likely but hardly guaranteed win at Stanford, but either way, the Huskies' argument -- that an outright regular-season conference title in a high-major, albeit really bad, conference should guarantee a spot in the NCAA tournament -- looks even more specious now. Washington, like the rest of this league, has nothing in the way of nonconference results to point to as proof that it is considerably better than the RPI's impression of the Pac-12 as the 10th-best league in the country. It will be fascinating to see how the committee treats UW, and the Pac-12 as a whole, but if I'm the Huskies I'm planning on making a very deep run through the Pac-12 tournament, just to be safe.

Marshall 79, Southern Miss 75: Will a loss at Marshall damage Southern Miss's bubble chances? Doubtful. Marshall is a quality team -- a deep fringe bubble candidate in its own right -- and a four-point loss in the Herd's building isn't, or shouldn't, be the kind of thing that damages a team's bubble chances. What's more, the Golden Eagles still own an RPI within the top 20. In the past 16 years, no team with an RPI of 20 higher has ever missed the tournament. (The closest was 2005-06 Missouri State, which didn't have nearly as strong a profile as this team.) They should be fine.

Maintenance-Minded Bubble Wins

Xavier 72, Charlotte 63: Xavier's final home win of the season wasn't what the Musketeers would have planned heading into the season. To wit, from the AP: "It was a bittersweet day for Xavier, which had grown accustomed to ending its final home game with a spray of confetti and a few celebratory snips of the net. The Musketeers' streak of five straight A-10 regular-season titles was snapped this season." That dream was over weeks ago. Xavier has bigger fish to slice now. The Musketeers are as close to the bubble as you can be (Lunardi's most recent bracket has them as the first team outside the field). A win won't necessarily change that, but a loss would have been disastrous, and Xavier is now in at least slightly better position as it heads into A-10 postseason play.

Northwestern 70, Iowa 66: It was very easy to imagine Northwestern -- which missed marquee wins (Michigan, Ohio State) in soul-crushing fashion twice in the past two weeks -- losing at Iowa. The Hawkeyes beat Wisconsin and Indiana at home in recent weeks, Northwestern would no doubt be feeling the historic tournament pressure, and so on. But this was an impressive victory, or at least as impressive as a victory over Iowa can ever be. This is a little like Xavier's win: It doesn't provide a bubble bump, but it does prevent a potentially disastrous move in the wrong direction at the worst possible time of the season. Is Northwestern in right now? I'd guess yes. But it's hardly a done deal. Like nearly everyone else on the bubble, the only way for Bill Carmody's team to enter Selection Sunday with any measure of confidence is to play well in next week's conference tournament. That much is clear.

Miami 77, Boston College 56: Same situation here: A loss would have been a dream-killer. A win doesn't move the needle. Miami basically has two tourney-worthy qualities on its profile: A win at Duke (huge) and a home win over Florida State (slightly less huge, but still important). But other than that, there's not much there. Can the Hurricanes knock off one of this league's top four teams -- especially Duke or UNC -- on a neutral floor next week? That might be the baseline requirement going forward.

Connecticut 74, Pittsburgh 65: The Huskies have spent much of the past three weeks looking downright determined to overcome their computer numbers (a top-five overall strength of schedule and a top-20 nonconference figure) and somehow, some way, miss the tournament. This week's loss to Providence was an apparent punctuation mark on a pretty much horrible Big East season, or at least horrible relative to this team's elite talent. After this win, though, it looks like UConn will -- just barely -- hold on to a spot above the bubble fray.

Editor’s note: Eamonn Brennan breaks down North Carolina-Duke in today’s Weekend Watch. Andy Katz offers a dozen more games to keep an eye on this weekend.

Saturday

West Virginia at South Florida (Noon ET, ESPN3): Tell me again why West Virginia is a lock for the NCAA tournament? The Mountaineers are sliding toward the Big East tournament, losing seven of their past 10 games. Meanwhile, South Florida has won seven of nine and picked up its most important victory of the season by beating Louisville at the KFC Yum! Center on Wednesday. Winning 12 in the Big East didn’t put the Bulls in by itself, but which school got the Bulls to 12 probably did the trick.

Georgetown at Marquette (2 ET, ESPN3): Georgetown humbled Notre Dame and beat down Villanova in its final two home games. The Hoyas can draw even with Marquette in second place with a win in Milwaukee. The Golden Eagles should be good to go at home, but which squad will show? Marquette looked like an Elite Eight team in last week's second-half comeback at West Virginia. But its performance at Cincinnati on Wednesday was more worthy of a first-round exit. Regardless, this could be a preview of a Big East tourney semifinal.

Ohio Valley title game (2 ET, ESPN2): The Ohio Valley could be the first bid thief of Championship Week. Murray State enters the OVC tournament with one loss and is playing for a high NCAA seed. Coach Steve Prohm is hopeful that an OVC win will equate to a top-four seed to protect the Racers. Putting Murray in Nashville might not be as much of a reach if it wins.

Washington at UCLA (2 ET, CBS): The Huskies have emerged as the class of the Pac-12. UCLA is trying to ensure that it still has class. The Bruins need some sort of momentum going into the Pac-12 tournament in Los Angeles. Washington has a chance to improve its NCAA seeding with a strong performance in L.A. and then next week at the Staples Center.

Louisville at Syracuse (4 ET, CBS): The Orange are the Big East No. 1 seed and a lock for a No. 1 NCAA seed. The question in this game is whether Louisville can find its offensive flow after a disheartening performance against South Florida. The Cardinals won’t get healthy at Syracuse but need to find an offensive identity before the Big East tournament.

Baylor at Iowa State (7 ET, ESPN3): Iowa State had Missouri on the ropes in Columbia earlier in the week; Baylor is finally starting to find its mojo at the right time of the season. Forgive the Bears if they drop this game in Ames — this is much more about Iowa State. The Cyclones are going to make the NCAA tournament and could be a spoiler in the Big 12 tourney. Don’t dismiss this team's chances stealing the Big 12 tournament.

Yale at Penn (7 ET): Penn has to sweep Brown and Yale to set up a possible showdown with Princeton that could hand the Ivy League title to Harvard with a Quakers loss (assuming Harvard wins at Columbia and Cornell) or set up a possible playoff game with the Crimson for the Ivy automatic bid.

Texas at Kansas (9 ET, ESPN): Texas passes a number of eye tests — except that the Longhorns haven’t taken down one of the Big 12's big three this season in Kansas, Missouri and Baylor. The Longhorns probably won’t get this one, but the game might be more about their ability to be competitive going into the Big 12 tournament.

Sunday

Kentucky at Florida (Noon ET, CBS): Kentucky is hoping to lock up an undefeated SEC season and ensure itself the No. 1 overall seed ahead of Syracuse. The Gators, meanwhile, have been a bit of an enigma. Florida needs some momentum going into the SEC tournament. The Gators will need to make 3s and Patric Young must stay on the court to be an effective post player.

Missouri Valley title game (2 ET, CBS): The OVC is the first bid thief possibility. Sunday’s MVC title game could be the second of the weekend. If Creighton and Wichita State are in this game, there isn’t a problem. But if a third team sneaks in there and wins, suddenly the MVC will get three bids. If it’s a Creighton-Wichita final Sunday, expect a great atmosphere and a highly competitive affair yet again.

Ohio State at Michigan State (4 ET, CBS): The Spartans are vying to win the Big Ten title outright, something that seemed like a bit of a reach when they started 0-2 and then Ohio State destroyed Duke. But the Spartans’ Feb. 11 victory at Ohio State might go down as one of the most significant in a conference this season. It shifted the power and put the Spartans in position possibly to get a No. 1 seed. Look for the Spartans to win on Draymond Green’s senior night, capping off a great career that should end with him grabbing a Big Ten player-of-the-year trophy over Jared Sullinger.

Purdue at Indiana (6 ET, BTN): The Hoosiers have been one of the best home-court teams in the country. But they rocked the Boilermakers in Mackey Arena by 17. Purdue doesn’t forget. This is a great chance for payback by Purdue, which has been on a high of late. These two teams are both going to be in the NCAA tournament, with legit chances to win a game.

Editor’s Note: To see our expert picks for each of the nation’s 12 top conferences, click here. To cast your vote in these races, visit SportsNation.

A quick look at the player and coach of the year races in the Pac-12:

Player of the Year

Last year, this race was easy. Derrick Williams (speaking of which, how about his line against the Clippers Tuesday night?) was simultaneously one of the nation's most exciting, important and efficient players. The 2011 Pac-10 player of the year ballot didn't require much in the way of deep, ruminative thought. Just write down "Derrick Williams, Arizona" and go enjoy the rest of your day.

The 2012 race is far less transparent. Perhaps that's an effect of the nature of this very down league, which lacks the diffuse top-flight NBA talent of the past decade. Or maybe it's just one of those years, in which the Pac-12 has a lot of solid players, and some very good ones, but no one obvious pick, no player whose performance has screamed "I'm better than everyone else here." When you look at the tempo-free stats -- offensive rating, for example -- the numbers seem to bear that out: Among players that used at least 24 percent of their team's possessions, the league's highest offensive rating belonged to Washington State's Brock Motum (108.9). By contrast, most other power six leagues have several players above that threshold, in some cases by a considerable margin.

Which, actually, is a good, quick way to insert Motum into this conversation. The chances Motum will win the official Pac-12 POY award are probably slim to none. His team's record (14-14 overall, 6-10 Pac-12, as of this writing) just isn't good enough to get him that kind of consideration. But Motum has been an efficient and versatile interior force for a team that desperately needed one when senior guard Faisal Aden suffered a career-ending ACL injury earlier this season. His surprise emergence kept an already-bad Wazzu team from totally falling off a cliff. They don't give many POY awards for "sneakily the most important player on a thoroughly mediocre team," so Motum won't win the award. But he is certainly worthy of a mention. The same can be said for Oregon State guard Jared Cunningham, who leads the league in points (18.7) and steals (2.6) average per game.

In the end, though, we have to give the nod to Washington guard Tony Wroten. Wroten has plenty of holes in his game, to be sure. He dominates the ball, and not always for the better. He's made just 9 of his 49 3-point attempts all season. His turnovers nearly eclipse his assists. And so on. But there are no perfect players in the Pac-12 this season -- there is no Derrick Williams -- and Wroten's overwhelming athleticism and playmaking ability at the off-guard spot has, for all occasional flaws, often been the difference in Washington's nine-wins-in-10-games run to the top of the Pac-12 standings this week. Cal's Jorge Gutierrez and Allen Crabbe deserve honorable mentions, as well, but Cal's strengths lie in its balance. Wroten has talent alongside him -- Terrence Ross could be a candidate, too -- but Wroten's total floor game (his averages: 16.7 points, 4.9 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 2.0 steals) make him arguably the most difficult player to gameplan for in the entire league. And as the season has worn on, the freshman has often raised his game.

It's no slam dunk. But very little in this year's Pac-12 is.

Coach of the Year

Coach of the Year is always a weird award, isn't it? Most voters seem to look at preseason predictions -- which the voters themselves (or the coaches, or both) create in the first place -- and judge a coach based on how his team performed against those expectations. This discounts the importance of recruiting, of managing elite talent, or both, and it tends to boil the award down to a pretty crude calculus.

Which is why we have to give this year's Pac-12 Coach of the Year honor to ... wait for it ... UCLA's Ben Howland.

Kidding, you guys! Kidding! Holster your angry comments! I just had to make sure you were paying attention, is all. (I have a better chance of winning the 2013 NBA Dunk Contest than Howland does of winning coach of the year. Ain't happenin'.)

All joking aside, and with apologies to likewise deserving leaders like Washington's Lorenzo Romar, Oregon's Dana Altman, Cal's Mike Montgomery and Arizona's Sean Miller, this year's Pac-12 Coach of the Year is -- or at least should be -- Colorado's Tad Boyle. Last offseason, Boyle lost his two best players (senior guard Cory Higgins and NBA-bound guard Alec Burks), and the Buffaloes were rightly expected to finish near the middle, or even the bottom half, of the Pac-12. But behind a stellar season from sophomore forward Andre Roberson, Boyle has his team currently sitting at 19-9 overall and 11-5 in the league with an outside shot -- a small one, but a shot nonetheless -- at sneaking into the NCAA tournament on Selection Sunday.

In 2011, with an NBA talent and a very productive senior leader on his team, the Buffs were one of the few deserving candidates to miss out on the Big Dance. That Boyle might yet get this year's team in that field is a testament to the job he's done in his second season.

Doug Gottlieb looks across the country at the teams on the bubble and what they each need to do to make the Big Dance, along with an examination of this week's key bubble battles. For a conference-by-conference look at the current bubble picture, check out Eamonn Brennan's Bubble Watch.

For all the ways you can diss the Pac-12 this season -- and you can start with the 1-29 record against the RPI top 50 in nonconference play, or look at the paucity of teams ranked inside Ken Pomeroy's adjusted efficiency top 50 (there are two), and so on and so forth -- you can't dispute this: This league is in for a fascinating final week.

Why? Cal's loss at Colorado on Sunday dropped the Bears to 13-4, where they're currently a half-game behind Washington, which just snuck past rival Washington State 59-55 on Saturday. If the Huskies win at USC and UCLA, they'll finish 15-3 and in sole possession of the conference title. If they stumble -- and provided Cal can get past Stanford on Sunday -- the Bears could still earn a share of a title they've appeared destined to win for much of the season. Forget NCAA tournament bubble implications. These coaches and players have a title to win.

Oh, and speaking of the tourney: There really are no guarantees. Cal is the closest thing to an exception, because it would be hard for the Bears to fall below the coterie of teams bunched around the bubble line on the S-Curve even after Sunday's loss in Boulder. But Washington? Arizona? The operative Bubble Watch phrase here is "work to do." The basketball has been uneven all season, but you can't dispute the intrigue and what promises to be a fiery debate in the weeks leading up to Selection Sunday. Stay tuned.

1. California: On Sunday, Cal lost 70-57 at Colorado. Just three days earlier, Stanford went to Boulder and beat the Buffaloes 74-50. You figure those two results out. I really can't. Cal still looks like the best team in the conference, and its still-solid efficiency numbers (the Bears rank No. 19 overall in KenPom's adjusted efficiency and No. 2 in the league in per-possession offense and defense, the best all-around numbers of any team in Pac-12 play) back that up. But they're far from a dominant outfit, which we saw in the offensively challenged performance at CU. Now the Bears have to win at rival Stanford -- and hope for a Washington loss -- to steal a share of the league title.

2. Washington: The Huskies now control whether they win the Pac-12 title. Wins at USC and UCLA would make them outright regular-season conference champs. Most Washington fans would assume, and understandably so, such an accomplishment would seal their team's NCAA tournament bid. But in this season's Pac-12, that isn't a guarantee. Remember, the committee doesn't look at conference record (at least, it says it doesn't), but it does look at nonconference performance and top-50 wins, among other things. This conference is severely lacking in both categories. One would assume 15-3 and the league title will be enough, but UW might not want to drop a game to the LA schools and test whether 14-4 does the trick.

3. Arizona: Seniors Kyle Fogg and Jesse Perry were determined to make their final regular-season home game a win, and their second-half efforts -- in which they combined for 28 of their team's 38 points -- ensured a crucial two-point victory over UCLA. Arizona's at-large chances remain a work in progress, but the win over the rival Bruins keeps them in the discussion heading into the finale against ASU and the Pac-12 tourney.

4. Oregon: Oregon's chances of notching an at-large bid aren't great, but Dana Altman's team kept its faint hopes alive by escaping from Corvallis with a one-point win over Oregon State on Sunday. Oregon finishes up with two home games versus Colorado and Utah. E.J. Singler and Devoe Joseph have really come on down the stretch for this team, giving the Ducks efficient offense on the wing, but the narrow losses to Oregon State, Cal and Colorado in the past month have kept Altman's team from breaking through to the top of the league.

5. Colorado: When you're on the bubble fringe, as Colorado is, the best you can do is take your chances when they come. That's what Tad Boyle's team did Sunday, beating league leader (and the only team in the league with a top-50 RPI) California. The Buffs have struggled on the road all season long, so season-closing road trips to Oregon and Oregon State will present their challenges. At this point, even with the Cal win in hand, CU's profile is such that it almost certainly has to win the next two and at least get to the Pac-12 tourney final to find itself in the NCAA tournament.

6. UCLA: The 2012 Bruins are still the 2012 Bruins -- disappointing, mediocre, occasionally not-quite-mediocre and then mediocre again. This week, UCLA beat Arizona State in Tempe and lost to Arizona in Tucson. It is 9-7 in league play. its longest winning and losing streaks in league play are three games and two games, respectively. In its past five games, UCLA has lost (to Cal), won (USC), lost (at St. John's), won (Arizona State) and lost (at Arizona). I think that pretty much sums it up.

7. Stanford: Can you explain the Cardinal's week? Because I can't. On Thursday, Stanford went to Colorado -- a team that beat Cal by 13 Sunday, mind you -- and won by 24 points. Then, on Saturday, Stanford lost. Yes, lost at Utah. Utah has played better, and clearly Colorado was off, and so on, but still. This league is weird.

8. Washington State: The Cougars nearly took down the Huskies in Pullman Saturday, a win that may well have sunk Washington's at-large hopes for good. Instead, Washington escaped with the 59-55 win, as Wazzu's offense -- which, pre-Faisal Aden injury, was one of the league's best while at home -- fell short.

9. Oregon State: The Beavers' one-point home loss to Oregon on Sunday was their fifth in a row, a losing streak that began with a home loss to the aforementioned Cougars and continued against Washington, Stanford and Cal. Back in November, Oregon State lost to Vanderbilt by two points on a neutral floor just two days after putting 100 points on a solid Texas team in an overtime victory. That was months ago now, but it feels even longer.

10. Arizona State: All things considered, this has been a disastrous season for Arizona State, from the losses to the ineligibility of freshman Jahii Carson to more losses to, well, more losses after that. In any other season, ASU is probably the worst team in this league. But not in 2012! So, you know, there's that.

11. Utah: We can say much of the same for the Utes. In any other season, Utah -- which changed coaches and conferences in the matter of 12 months and saw its best and most important player (Josh "Jiggy" Watkins) dismissed by coach Larry Krystkowiak in mid-January -- would be the worst team in this league. For much of the season, including that horrendous nonconference stretch, things appeared to be heading that way. But give the Utes some credit. They improved throughout the season, played hard and gave a bunch of putatively better teams occasionally serious challenges -- and even won some, including this weekend against Stanford.

12. USC: And also, USC is worse. The Trojans are averaging .83 points per trip (adjusted) in Pac-12 play. Overall, the Trojans' offensive efficiency ranks No. 318 in the country, per KenPom, which puts them one spot ahead of Eastern Michigan and one spot behind Arkansas-Pine Bluff. In 16 Pac-12 games, the Trojans have scored more than 60 points exactly twice. Saturday's loss at Arizona State dropped them to 1-15 in the worst Pac-12 we've seen in a really long time. In short, USC is bad.

Click here to read our afternoon recap. Now back to the lecture at hand, which comes in three parts:

The Rivalry

No. 2 Syracuse 71, Connecticut 69: One of the many things to love about this Syracuse team -- besides its great zone defense and incredible depth and talent and length and pretty much everything besides defensive rebounding -- is how well it handles close games. Since the Jan. 21 loss at Notre Dame, Syracuse has taken respective best shots from Cincinnati, West Virginia, Georgetown, Louisville, South Florida and now at UConn, and each time the Orange have either pulled away late or made the key stop down the stretch to preserve the narrow win. It's a real skill, and it isn't entirely intangible; when you have a defense this good, you tend to get a lot of stops, and there's no reason why that wouldn't be true in the final minutes of any given game, too. But however you quantify it, the Orange win close games. Such traits tend to come in handy in March.

As for Connecticut? While the Huskies didn't get the win, they appear to be rounding into form, or at least starting to figure a few things out. UConn had its fair share of issues with Syracuse's zone, and there were plenty of bad shots to be had, but the Huskies were much more balanced (four players finished in double figures, while Ryan Boatright and Shabazz Napier combined for 13 assists) and competent on both ends of the floor in the second half. Unless it suddenly begins shooting the ball from outside at a much higher clip, this team probably has a ceiling. But there are plenty of realistic improvements to be made. Even better, many of them appear to be in progress. Let's not bury this team just yet.

The Upsets

Purdue 75, No. 13 Michigan 61: When Purdue guard Ryne Smith was asked what he thought about guard Kelsey Barlow's dismissal from the team last week, he was direct, even curt: "Addition by subtraction," Smith said. Apparently he was right. Whatever the reason, Purdue played its best game of the season Saturday at the most important time, containing Michigan's outside shooters and slowly stretching a second-half lead thanks to the heady play of point guard Lewis Jackson, forward Robbie Hummel and, most importantly, guard Terone Johnson, who scored a career-high 22 points and made a handful of key plays down the stretch, including two big and-1 finishes around the rim. Purdue is an unconventional team with no true post presence; the Boilermakers rely on Hummel's outside-in versatility and an extended, guard-oriented style. This makes them a great matchup for Michigan, and, in their own way, a dangerous team.

In any case, Purdue can now feel entirely safe about its at-large NCAA tournament chances. Beating Michigan at home -- the Wolverines' first home loss of the season -- is most definitely a signature victory. And it couldn't have come at a better time.

TCU 83, No. 21 New Mexico 64: Let's hear it for TCU! A round of applause is most definitely in order. At this time in 2011, the Horned Frogs were in the midst of a season-ending 13-game losing streak, en route to an 11-22 finish. This season is an entirely different story: TCU is playing its best basketball down the stretch, having won four of its past five (and eight in a row at home) and toppling ranked UNLV and New Mexico and a good Colorado State squad in the process. The key: great 3-point shooting. The Horned Frogs lead the league in long-range makes in conference play, and they're undefeated at home as a result. What a difference a year makes.

In the meantime ... um, what happened to New Mexico? Last Saturday, we watched in near-awe as the Lobos thoroughly dominated UNLV, which came just a few days after a 10-point win at San Diego State. Steve Alford's team, once a relatively unheralded efficiency darling with few good wins to show for it, looked set to run away with the Mountain West and make a deep run into March. Since then, the Lobos are 0-2 and are now in a three-way tie. A loss at Colorado State makes some sense; we know the Rams are tough, particularly at home. And this is not to take away from TCU, which (as you just read above) is giving everyone more than they bargained for in February, particularly in their own building. But a 19-point blowout loss? Isn't this the team that just rolled UNLV in the Pit and moved to 8-2 in the league? It's kind of weird, right?

Georgia 76, No. 11 Florida 62: This is an upset, of course, but I'm not sure we should be all that surprised. Frankly, I'm not sure if a Florida loss should ever truly catch us off guard. Don't get me wrong: The Gators are good. But they're a specific kind of good. When their steady diet of 3s are falling, they can shoot opponents off the floor before said opponents even have a chance to catch their breath. But if the shots aren't going down, Florida has no Plan B. Patric Young is the only true post presence, and his offensive game is still a work in progress (and he's still underutilized as a scoring threat to boot). The Gators' defense -- which ranks fifth in opponents' points per possession in SEC play, No. 10 in opponents' 3-point field goal percentage and No. 10 in block rate -- still isn't good enough to hold opponents in check when the shots clanging off the iron and the opponents start turning long rebounds into secondary breaks and easy buckets. Florida might yet get there on the defensive end, but it isn't yet. If this UF team has a lower ceiling than it should, well, that's why.

The Bubble Specials

Alabama 67, Mississippi State 50: It was instinctively easy to write off the Crimson Tide when coach Anthony Grant suspended Tony Mitchell and JaMychal Green; it was easy to predict a late collapse, even a fall off the bubble, for a team whose two leading scorers would be missing such important games down the stretch. Instead, the Crimson Tide keep, well, rolling. They've now won three in a row and prevented any hint of a collapse. Mississippi State, on the other hand, appears to be doing exactly that: The Bulldogs are collapsing. This is the Bulldogs' fifth consecutive defeat, a stretch that has included some good basketball (in the near-miss vs. Kentucky this week) but also some baffling losses (the loss at Auburn especially). It's no stretch to say Mississippi State -- which for much of the season looked like a tourney near-lock -- could wind up missing the tournament after all. The Bulldogs are, after all, 6-8 and tied with rival Ole Miss in the SEC standings. Ouch.

Northwestern 67, Penn State 66: Breathe a big ol' sigh of relief, Northwestern fans: In the chase for their first NCAA tournament appearance in school history, the Wildcats remain very much alive. Senior forward John Shurna made the game-winning free throws with just 2.6 seconds remaining, giving Bill Carmody his first win in State College since 2002. Big challenges still lie ahead: Ohio State comes to town on Wednesday, followed by next weekend's season-ender at Iowa, a team that just knocked off Indiana and Wisconsin in Carver-Hawkeye Arena. But for now, some minor rejoicing is in order. Northwestern's tourney hopes are still very real.

Rutgers 77, Seton Hall 72 (OT): Let's not take Seton Hall off the bubble just yet, eh? The Pirates got a great win over Georgetown this week, one that could have firmed up a previously shaky at-large profile. All Seton Hall needed to do the rest of the way was avoid bad losses. Well, losing to a young, 13-16 Rutgers team at home is just that. Next weekend, the Hall travels to DePaul. If the Pirates lose there, all the good vibes from the emphatic Georgetown victory will have almost entirely faded from the picture.

VCU 89, George Mason 77: First things first: Thanks to Drexel's one-point win at Old Dominion on Saturday afternoon, VCU's win over George Mason won't give them a share of the CAA title this season. Bummer, sure, but the Rams would surely settle for a spot in the NCAA tournament, something to which they're at least a little closer after this victory today. As a league, the Colonial's top teams (Drexel, VCU and GMU) didn't get quality nonconference wins (VCU's best came against South Florida, for example), so any at-large consideration will have to come from separation at the top and perhaps a pair of deep runs for both Drexel and VCU in the CAA tournament. A win here was a must, and Shaka Smart's team got it, behind Bradford Burgess' career-high 31 points.

Dayton 76, UMass 43: A home loss to UMass can't be called "bad," but for a team like Dayton -- which is desperately scrapping for a spot in the NCAA tournament -- it could have been disastrous. Instead, the opposite happened: UD won, and won big, looking very much like one of the A-10's best teams and a squad worthy of a tourney bid in the process. We'll see how the Flyers finish up, but if they're one of the last four in, they might just be one of the play-in game candidates, which are held in -- you guessed it -- Dayton!

Saint Joseph's 82, No. 22 Temple 72: Speaking of somewhat fringe Atlantic 10 tournament hopefuls, the A-10 can't offer a bubble team a better shot at a marquee win than Temple on its own floor late in the season, but the Hawks still had to overcome Fran Dunphy's typically peerless bunch, which had won its previous 11 games and 13 in the 15-game stretch beginning with its Jan. 4 victory over Duke. Phil Martelli's team is now 9-6 in the league and 19-11 overall, and it added the one thing it desperately needed to its profile: A legitimate top-25 RPI win. Temple is most definitely that.

Penn 55, Harvard 54: Just when you think it's time to plan a long-awaited Harvard hoops coronation, Penn's Zack Rosen comes along, scores 20 points, makes a huge jumper down the stretch and ices two game-winning free throws in the final 30 seconds. And all of a sudden the Ivy League race is legitimately up for grabs with both of these teams having two losses. (Another one-game playoff for the Crimson? Oh boy.) As an at-large entity, Harvard is still in decent shape, but its profile isn't so strong that it can afford to lose at either Columbia or Cornell in its final two games, lose out on the Ivy auto-bid, and still feel safe about being picked to join the group of 37 at-large teams. Big days ahead for Tommy Amaker's team.

Washington 59, Washington State 55: For the first 10 or so minutes of the first half, it looked like Wazzu was going to hand its in-state opponent the type of loss that would severely damage Washington's at-large chances. But the Huskies fought back and, as the AP report notes, won the game's most important battle -- at the charity stripe: "Ultimately, the game came down to free throws. WSU (14-14, 6-10) went 11 of 12 to keep the game tied at 28-all despite shooting 27 percent in the first half. In the second half, the Cougars shot 6 of 20 from the free throw line, while the Huskies, who only went 2 of 5 in the first half, finished 17 of 24." The win keeps Washington on the right side of the bubble for now, but UW's marginal profile might not be able to survive a loss at either USC or UCLA going away.

Xavier 65, Richmond 57: Kenny Frease's season highs in both points (19) and rebounds (14) helped carry Xavier to an ugly but ultimately victorious Saturday. A loss here would have kicked Xavier off the bubble for good and almost certainly, barring an upset in the A-10 tournament, ended Chris Mack's 100 percent NCAA tournament hit rate in his XU tenure. Instead, the Musketeers live to fight another day.

No. 21 San Diego State 74, Colorado State 66: The Rams pass at least two NCAA tournament bubble tests: The RPI/SOS numbers are great, and they sure do look like a tournament team. But will that be enough? A win in Viejas Arena would have provided a tidy bookend to this week's huge victory over New Mexico, but the loss isn't a huge deal. Colorado State, which is undefeated at home in Mountain West play, hosts UNLV in Fort Collins in just three days' time. Win that one and the Rams are probably set.