Georgia State’s men’s basketball team will go for its 15th consecutive win when it plays at Troy on Saturday.
Even if the Panthers (17-6, 10-0) are able to keep winning all the way through the Sun Belt tournament and stretch the streak to 24 games, that likely won’t significantly improve their seeding in the NCAA tournament.
ESPN’s Joe Lunardi projects the Panthers as a 14th seed and said that a 13 or 14 “is their most-likely landing spot, barring anything extraordinary one way or another.”
Lunardi, who projects the tournament field for ESPN, said the Panthers are more likely to move up than down, but likely won’t advance past 12. Most of the seeds higher than a 12 tend to go to at-large teams, and he said Georgia State likely won’t have a profile better than enough of them to slide up.
Georgia State coach Ron Hunter said he doesn’t care what parenthetically enclosed number appears next to his team should they make it to the tournament. He just wants to make it to the tournament.
“We haven’t been in this tournament in so long (2001), to me it doesn’t matter,” said Hunter, in his third season at Georgia State. “Our goal was to win the conference and get to the tournament. Never said we wanted to win the tournament and get seeded ‘x.’”
To improve its seeding, Georgia State’s RPI, a formula used to help gauge the worth of teams for tournament consideration and seeding, would need to improve. Georgia State is ranked 89th, according to ESPN’s RPI formula. Georgia State’s remaining schedule makes it mathematically improbable — if not impossible — for them to advance into the 50s.
The four 11th seeds in the mock tournament bracket Lunardi posted Thursday, with RPI in parenthesis, were: Minnesota (38), Southern Miss (41), Tennessee (50) and BYU (49).
Jerry Palm’s mock bracket on CBSSports.com, posted Monday, has Georgia State as a 15th seed.
Being a double-digit seed doesn’t imply that a team is blowout material. Florida Gulf Coast last year became the first 15-seed to advance to the Sweet 16.
“I think (Georgia State) is really dangerous,” Lunardi said. “If Florida Gulf Coast can do what it did as a 15, Georgia State can make some noise (seeded) 12-13.”
Lunardi points to Georgia State’s success on the road this season as evidence that if the Panthers can make it to the tournament they could do well.
After starting 0-5 away from the GSU Sports Arena, the Panthers are riding a seven-game win streak on the road.
“They won’t be afraid when they get into a neutral site against a ranked team,” Lunardi said.
He said Georgia State’s seeding likely will be strong enough that it won’t play a Kansas, Syracuse or Michigan. Instead, he said it will play teams in the next tier down, all of whom will have lost several games. Lunardi’s mock bracket, posted Thursday, has the Panthers matched against Creighton (20-4, RPI of 12).
Others disagree. Palm’s bracket has Georgia State playing Kansas, the team with the highest RPI, according to ESPN.
But first the Panthers have to win the Sun Belt tournament and earn the automatic seed. They likely won’t be considered as an at-large team. Very few at-large teams historically have RPIs higher than in the 50s.
“I don’t know that they have the wins out of conference to hang their hat on in their case,” Lunardi said. “I’m not saying it’s right or wrong, but it’s how it has worked forever and ever. When you are from a predominately one-bid league, that’s what happens.”
That’s one of the reasons Hunter doesn’t enjoy talking about anything other than the next game. Though the Panthers are on a roll, it takes only one bad game in the Sun Belt tournament for everything to be undone.
“If we are a 12, I’ll be ecstatic,” Hunter said. “For Georgia State and the Sun Belt, that would be amazing. It’s hard to think that way. I know we are getting close to the end, there’s still so much work to do.”
About the Author
