Reader…so much to say, so little time. But there’s always time for disclaimers!
The Usual Disclaimers
- Projections attempt to simulate what the selection committee would do given what we know about each team. This is not my opinion of the teams, this is my prediction of the committee’s opinion.
- This bracketology is a snapshot, frozen in time. It does not aim to predict what will happen; it is a simulation of what would happen if the season ended today.
- Conference champions are determined by whoever has the fewest losses in conference play, with NET used as a tiebreaker.
- Projections made based on NET data entering Monday but win-loss records entering Tuesday
- Please feel free to @ me on Twitter with any comments, questions, concerns
I’m not going to lie, I’m kind of in disbelief that so many of you actually care about my opinion. “So many” is relative, of course, but still! WordPress tells me 173 people visited this rinkydink blog yesterday, and I didn’t even post anything. This site didn’t have that many visitors during the entire month of February 2023.
I’m just some kid with a spreadsheet and a love of college basketball. What’s that you say? I’m not a kid, I’m 25 years old? Nonsense! I’m still a student. I wear a backpack. Real adults have briefcases or something.
But I digress. There is a cruel irony to me skyrocketing up the Bracket Matrix rankings just in time for one of the busiest winters of my life. I wish I could post more often, write more, do a deep dive into what I learned from the selection committee’s top 16 preview or the linguistic phenomena that cause me to hear the word “matrix” whenever committee chair Dr. Charles McLelland says the word “metrics”. But it’s 2:10 AM and I have jobs to apply to and readings to do and clinic work waiting for me.
Welcome to late February. The grind starts now. We are, as the Backyardigans once famously sang, Into the Thick of It. And so am I. May your team get that quad 1 road win it so desperately needs, and may my projections this season preserve enough of my credibility to get you to return next year when I have more time on my hands. I’ll be back with more on the 27th.
Oh and one more thing––accessibility is very important to us (me) here at jake likers bracketology dot wordpress dot com, but I’ve encountered a problem with the tool I’ve been using to post the projections in text format. I haven’t had the time to fix it, so in the meantime, if you use a screen reader or are unable to decipher the graphic for whatever reason, please leave a comment or dm me on Twitter and I will personally provide you with a text version of the predictions.
See you in a week!
Jake Liker's Bracketology 