Miami's shocking loss in MAC Tournament to UMass upends Bracketology bubble talk

One of the biggest storylines in all of college basketball has been the Miami RedHawks of Ohio, who managed to complete an unbeaten regular season at 31-0. The issue with them has been the rough metrics, lack of quality wins and a poor schedule overall, which makes for a shaky resume. In fact, the biggest sell to Miami has been the fact that they’re unbeaten and that there’s no way a team with zero losses in the regular season can miss out on the NCAA Tournament.

Entering the MAC Tournament on Thursday, Miami wasn’t even the favorite to win the league. Akron, who has far better metrics and only had a loss at the RedHawks (only played each other once in the regular season), was viewed as the favorite in the tournament and a loss to them wouldn’t be bad.

But what about losing to UMass?

The Minutemen struggled to even make the MAC Tournament in its first year in the new conference, getting the 8-seed. They were competitive against Miami in the regular season but still lost. However, the RedHawks have been playing with fire the last two weeks, having three straight wins by just two points. 

Miami looked to be in control against UMass, up around double-digits early in the second half. But the Minutemen had one more run in them, slowly creeping up and taking the lead late before holding on for the 87-83 upset win. It’s a Quad 4 disaster (could turn into Quad 3), but as bad a loss the RedHawks could’ve taken.

So are they out? The good news for them is that everyone else has been losing on the bubble, including Indiana, Stanford, and others who can’t do anything until Selection Sunday. But they have good wins, whereas Miami just has wins.

Had they lost to Akron in the MAC Championship, this probably isn’t an issue. And there’s a chance a bid thief has emerged out of the conference at the expense of another bubble team. But it’s a legit question, with massive ramifications if Miami were to get left out.