Dance Chance post-mortem 2012: Last three in, weren't - Seton Hall, Oral Roberts, and Miami miss

There was plenty of good, some bad, and not too much ugly with out Dance Chance projections this year.

The worst: Three of our picks didn't get in at all. Mitigating that, they were our last three teams in. That means our first 34 at-large picks made it.

Last year, we were wrong on two picks, and were correct on all of the #1 and #2 seeds, one of only two brackets in the entire Bracket Matrix to do so.

This year, we missed one of the #1 seeds; we had Kansas instead of Michigan State. But as a whole, we got the correct 8 teams as 1- and 2-seeds:

#	Team	Conference	Div I record	Conf record	RPI rank	RealWins rank	T50 wins	SOS	Dance Chance	Proj Seed	True Seed
1	Kentucky	SEC	32-2	16-0	2	1	9	25	100%	1	1
2	Syracuse	Big East	31-2	17-1	1	2	11	22	100%	1	1
3	North Carolina	ACC	29-5	14-2	4	5	8	5	100%	1	1
4	Kansas	Big 12	27-6	16-2	6	10	11	11	100%	1	2
5	Duke	ACC	27-6	13-3	5	4	7	2	100%	2	2
6	Missouri	Big 12	30-4	14-4	10	7	11	69	100%	2	2
7	Michigan St.	Big Ten	26-7	13-5	3	3	11	1	100%	2	1
8	Ohio St.	Big Ten	27-7	13-5	7	6	9	7	100%	2	2

This year's top 8 teams were pretty easy to pick, as the 2-seeds were nearly as strong as the 1-seeds. We suspected the Big Ten winner would get a 1-seed, but our formula didn't even get them close to the top, as the Spartans finished #7 in our rankings. There wasn't much difference between North Carolina at #3 and Michigan State at #7, but we stuck with our formula.

#	Team	Conference	Div I record	Conf record	RPI rank	RealWins rank	T50 wins	SOS	Dance Chance	Proj Seed	True Seed
9	Marquette	Big East	25-7	14-4	9	13	5	17	100%	3	3
10	Florida St.	ACC	24-9	12-4	11	9	5	4	100%	3	3
11	Baylor	Big 12	26-7	12-6	8	16	9	10	100%	3	3
12	Michigan	Big Ten	23-9	13-5	13	15	7	13	100%	3	4
13	Louisville	Big East	26-9	10-8	14	8	8	8	100%	4	4
14	Indiana	Big Ten	25-8	11-7	17	12	8	31	100%	4	4
15	Vanderbilt	SEC	24-10	10-6	19	11	5	6	100%	4	5
16	Georgetown	Big East	22-8	12-6	15	22	7	14	100%	4	3

The threes and fours were pretty good, too. Michigan, our lowest 3-seed, was actually a 4. But Georgetown, our lowest four, was a three. Vanderbilt's win over Kentucky moved them to a 4-seed on our list, but they were just a five. Sometimes it seems that games on the last day don't have as much impact with the committee, who deliberates for days without knowing that result.

#	Team	Conference	Div I record	Conf record	RPI rank	RealWins rank	T50 wins	SOS	Dance Chance	Proj Seed	True Seed
17	Wichita St.	MVC	26-5	16-2	12	19	2	56	100%	5	5
18	Wisconsin	Big Ten	24-9	12-6	23	21	6	16	100%	5	4
19	Memphis	C-USA	26-8	13-3	16	14	5	20	100%	5	8
20	Temple	Atlantic 10	24-7	13-3	20	17	4	54	100%	5	5
21	Creighton	MVC	28-5	14-4	24	18	3	102	100%	6	8
22	Murray St.	Ohio Valley	27-1	15-1	22	33	3	158	100%	6	6
23	Florida	SEC	23-10	10-6	30	24	4	24	100%	6	7
24	Cincinnati	Big East	24-10	12-6	42	20	7	65	100%	6	6

The fives and sixes were okay, but Memphis was our worst mis-seeding, our only pick that was off by more than 2 seeds. The Tigers only got an 8-seed; we suspected that our C-USA picks were a bit high, as well as our Missouri Valley seeds. We got Wichita State correct but Creighton was 2 seeds too high.

#	Team	Conference	Div I record	Conf record	RPI rank	RealWins rank	T50 wins	SOS	Dance Chance	Proj Seed	True Seed
25	Notre Dame	Big East	22-11	13-5	39	23	4	38	100%	7	7
26	Gonzaga	West Coast	25-6	13-3	25	36	5	78	99.9	7	7
27	New Mexico	Mtn West	26-6	10-4	27	25	6	82	99.9	7	5
28	Iowa St.	Big 12	22-10	12-6	33	40	5	39	99.9	7	8
29	Southern Miss	C-USA	23-8	11-5	21	27	3	47	99.9	8	9
30	Alabama	SEC	21-11	9-7	36	29	3	30	99.0	8	9
31	Nevada Las Vegas	Mtn West	24-8	9-5	18	31	5	41	96.3	8	6
32	San Diego St.	Mtn West	24-7	10-4	26	35	6	58	94.7	8	6

We hit turbulence on the 7s and 8s, with only a couple of correct picks. The Mountain West was our worst conference; though we had four teams in, they were all mis-seeded, three of them too low by 2 seeds each.

#	Team	Conference	Div I record	Conf record	RPI rank	RealWins rank	T50 wins	SOS	Dance Chance	Proj Seed	True Seed
33	Connecticut	Big East	20-13	8-10	32	30	3	3	92.2	9	9
34	St. Mary's	West Coast	25-5	14-2	28	59	4	103	92.0	9	7
35	St. Louis	Atlantic 10	24-7	12-4	31	28	2	89	90.0	9	9
36	Purdue	Big Ten	21-12	10-8	47	34	3	28	85.4	9	10
37	Kansas St.	Big 12	21-10	10-8	48	45	6	55	78.9	10	8
38	California	Pac-12	24-9	13-5	37	41	0	85	73.1	10	12
39	West Virginia	Big East	19-13	9-9	57	37	4	18	70.4	10	10
40	South Florida	Big East	19-13	12-6	52	51	2	27	69.3	10	12

Our 9- and 10- picks were similarly sloppy: we underseeded St. Mary's by two seeds (we wrote about our theory that they'd get the same seed as Gonzaga, but stuck with our formula's pick of a 9-seed). Our top 10-seed, Kansas State, was an 8, and our #2 10-seed, California, became a play-in 12-seed, as did our final 10-seed, USF.

#	Team	Conference	Div I record	Conf record	RPI rank	RealWins rank	T50 wins	SOS	Dance Chance	Proj Seed	True Seed
41	Xavier	Atlantic 10	21-12	10-6	41	32	4	36	67.1	11	10
42	Virginia	ACC	22-9	9-7	53	49	2	86	65.8	11	10
43	North Carolina State	ACC	22-12	9-7	49	46	1	26	63.3	11	11
44	Virginia Commonwealth	Colonial Ath	28-6	15-3	38	26	0	154	58.5	11	12

The 11s were pretty good, overall. We got these teams basically in the right order, though off by a seed in three cases.

Now the bubble:

45	Colorado St.	Mtn West	19-11	8-6	29	52	3	9	58.1	12	11
46	Seton Hall	Big East	20-12	8-10	68	47	3	49	53.7	12	x
47	Colorado	Pac-12	21-11	11-7	62	58	2	72	53.0	12	11
48	Oral Roberts	Summit	27-6	17-1	51	56	2	193	50.3	12	x
49	Miami FL	ACC	19-12	9-7	60	61	2	43	50.2	12	x
50	Harvard	Ivy League	25-4	12-2	35	57	1	184	50.1	12	12
51	Mississippi St.	SEC	21-11	8-8	75	44	2	79	47.5
52	Texas	Big 12	20-13	9-9	50	77	4	19	46.3		11
53	Marshall	C-USA	20-13	9-7	44	48	4	23	45.5
54	Iona	Metro Atl	25-7	15-3	40	39	0	144	44.5		14

As we mentioned, our last three in didn't make it. Seton Hall is the one that surprises us, since Oral Roberts and Miami were just a hair above the waterline, and both not very convincing cases. Seeing other brackets around the web, we suspected that those two would be replaced by Texas and BYU, and that indeed occurred. But Seton Hall didn't make it, while Iona did, despite hardly being mentioned by most bracketologists.

The three teams that got in were all on our bubble at various times in the last few weeks. Before Sunday's Atlantic 10 final, Texas was our last team in; the Longhorns made it as an 11-seed.

Iona was still in our bracket for several days after their loss in the Metro Atlantic; in fact, the Gaels were in just a few days ago, but they lost their only top 50 RPI win and fell out.

BYU who bumped in and out of our play-in line before sinking rapidly the last several days, down to around a 20% chance by our system.

#	Team	Conference	Div I record	Conf record	RPI rank	RealWins rank	T50 wins	SOS	Dance Chance	Proj Seed	True Seed
69	Brigham Young	West Coast	23-8	12-4	45	90	1	101	19.2		14

Their lack of good wins and triple digit SOS led to their decline; they also lost one of their only RPI top 50 wins recently when Oregon lost in the Pac-12 tournament. So while Texas and Iona were our 2nd and 4th teams out, BYU was our 17th team out! That one qualifies as ugly.

Interestingly, two of our missed teams were added as 14-seeds, which is an unexpected turn the committee took. It implies that those teams are lower than all the 13-seed automatic conference bids Ohio, Davidson, Montana, and New Mexico State, and a full two seeds lower than the other two play-in teams, who are 12-seeds. It makes bracketology that much harder when the committee does things like that.

But then of course, the whole play-in game idea is stupid to begin with, so what can you do.