We are now just five days away from Selection Sunday. The regular season has come to a close and postseason play has commenced. The Louisville Cardinals lost their only game last week at Virginia. Louisville enters the ACC tournament this weekend as the 3-seed, setting up a potential rubber match with UVA in the semifinals if both teams win on Thursday.
As of right now, the Cards appear to be in line for a 4-seed unless they can win three games in Greensboro this weekend. Louisville’s record against current quadrant-1 teams is 4-6. That is not great. Louisville could potentially pick up two more quad-1 wins if they were to win the ACC tournament. That would put them in a much better position for the 3-line. A loss in the championship game could be good enough depending on how things shape up elsewhere.
The lack of ACC depth has really hurt Louisville. Last season, Louisville played 14 games against the first quadrant. This year, they only had 10 such opportunities and were unable to take advantage of them. The fact of the matter is that there is a long list of teams with more quad-1 wins. Only having one loss outside of the first quadrant is why Louisville is still in position for a top-4 seed. Getting to .500 in quad-1 games would do a lot for the resume. The good news? The one seeds are not looking nearly as intimidating as usual. Kansas has been excellent for about two months now, but aside from the Jayhawks there is not a 1-seed that should scare Louisville if they end up as a 4-seed and have to face them in the Sweet-16.
Bracketology Projections as of 3/10 (Links Included).
ESPN: 4 seed in the West playing Akron
CBS: 4 seed in the East playing Liberty
FOX: 4 seed in the West playing Vermont
SB Nation: 4 seed in the East playing Vermont
USA Today: 4 seed in the Midwest playing Belmont
Sports Illustrated: 3/4 seed
NCAA.com: 4 seed in the Midwest playing Vermont
TeamRankings: 4 seed (13th overall)
BracketMatrix Aggregator: 4 seed (15th overall)
ACC Bracketology:
The ACC has four locks: Florida State, Duke, Louisville and Virginia. NC State appears to be the only other team on the bubble at this point. The majority of projections have the Wolfpack as one of the last few teams out right now. It would probably take a win over Duke in the quarterfinals for NC State to make it into the field.
As of now, this is where the ACC stands according to the BracketMatrix Aggregator.
Florida State: 2 seed (6th overall)
Duke: 3 seed (9th overall)
Louisville: 4 seed (15th overall)
Virginia: 7 seed (25th overall)
NC State: First Five Out
