NCAA Basketball: Are SoCon, ASUN and Ohio Valley multi-bid leagues?
A couple of teams from Nashville
Two other teams that deserve serious consideration for an at-large berth should they need it are Lipscomb out of the Atlantic Sun and Belmont from the Ohio Valley. The Lipscomb Bisons are 21-5 and 12-1 and currently tied for first with Liberty. Only one of their five losses, the one to Clemson was by more than double digits, the others were to Belmont twice, Louisville and Liberty. Their biggest win was a nine-point victory at No. 18 TCU and the Bisons are 37th in the NET and have four wins over the first two quads. If Lipscomb Fails to repeat you are still looking at a 25+ win team that has done everything asked of them to earn a bid.
Like Lipscomb, Belmont is in a dogfight with Murray State in the Ohio Valley. Both teams are 21-4 and 12-2, but Belmont has wins over UCLA, Western Kentucky and the lone meeting with Murray State. They lost to a Purdue team who could win the Big Ten, Green Bay, and Jacksonville State twice in the OVC. They are 59th in the NET with a 5-2 record across the first two quads and a 210 strength of schedule, but their non-conference strength of schedule is 77th best.
With this being the first year of the NET it will be interesting to see how the committee utilizes them. With the perfect storm of high-major teams being exceedingly mediocre, and a good number of mid-major teams having exceptional years (relative to their normal seasons), if some of these teams don’t get at-large bids, their strength of schedule is likely to be the main reason.
Next. Ranking last 25 national champions. dark
Those are things that are unlikely to change because the level of their conference is unlikely to change and the level of teams the committee would like mid-majors to play are highly unlikely to schedule them. This needs to be the season need to get at-large bids if they need them, if not, they likely never will.