ASU Basketball: NCAA Tournament chances at Pac-12 midpoint

Halfway through the conference schedule, ASU basketball is 15-6 (6-3 Pac-12). So, what are the Sun Devils’ NCAA Tournament chances?

Following a season of parity, order has been restored to the alpha dogs of college basketball. Blue-blood programs once again reign supreme as Tennessee, Duke and Virginia rest atop the Associated Press poll.

In spite of benchmarks set by the elite, a number of teams appeared poised to compete, building off progress from the season prior. Among them – Arizona State.

Selected to finish sixth in the Pac-12 preseason media poll, coach Bobby Hurley and the Sun Devils were underdogs coming into the year. With two returning starters, a pair of experienced transfers and a top-20 recruiting class, ASU won its first seven games.

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But, unlike last year’s group that reached No. 3 in the AP poll, Hurley’s most recent team was unable to emerge unscathed from the season’s first three months.

Now, nine games into Pac-12 play, we evaluate Arizona State’s chances of returning to the NCAA Tournament.

Strength of Schedule

In examining the Sun Devils’ case thus far, their schedule is worth noting. Last season, it was marquee victories over Xavier (neutral) and Kansas (away) that helped ASU into the field of 68 despite finishing below .500 in the Pac-12.

Under Hurley, daunting out-of-conference matchups have become the norm and 2018-19 is no exception, hosting formerly top-ranked Kansas, neutral site contests against Mississippi State and Nevada as well as a two-game road trip at Georgia and Vanderbilt.

ASU picked up two Quadrant 1 wins, upsetting the Bulldogs in Sin City before stunning the Jayhawks for a second straight year.

Those results are the cover letter to the Sun Devils’ résumé, however; there are blemishes capable of tarnishing both wins. Notably, losses to Princeton and Utah in Wells Fargo Arena.

Princeton came to Tempe with ASU looking to carry momentum over from the Kansas win. Instead, the team shot 32 percent, including three misses in the final moments. Since the game was at home and the Tigers are No. 166 in the NET ratings (as of Feb. 1), it goes down as a Quadrant 4 loss.

Against Utah, it appeared the Sun Devils were on their way to a rout in their conference opener, racing out to 28-11 lead. The Utes outscored them 85-58 the rest of the way, handing ASU a defeat in Quadrant 3.

A factor that aided the Sun Devils a year ago was, in spite of a subpar conference record, they didn’t have what some experts deemed a ‘bad loss’ until the penultimate weekend of the season.

Room to Improve

Losing back-to-back games against Princeton and Utah put ASU in a hole all-too-familar to the one it found itself in last year. The more challenging side of that predicament is the overall weak nature of the Pac-12.

Playing in what’s widely considered the weakest major conference, the Sun Devils’ wins buoy their postseason chances while losses are debilitating to their hopes.

With nine conference games remaining, noteworthy outcomes include wins over Arizona and Oregon at home and at UCLA, all in Quadrant 2. ASU nearly pulled off its first road sweep since Jan. 2010 and picked up an additional Quadrant 1 win at USC before crumbling late against the Trojans.

Remaining opportunities in Quadrant 1 come at home on Feb. 9 against Washington in addition to the possibility on the road in Eugene and Tucson late in the season.

Expert Projections

Prior to projections, here’s how the Sun Devils’ stack up in a number of rankings.

NCAA NET: No. 59
Jeff Sagarin: No. 48
Pomeroy (KenPom): No. 55
BPI: No. 54

At 15-6 (6-3), Arizona State is currently inside the cutoff line, according to most bracketologists.

ESPN’s Joe Lunardi has the Sun Devils in the field of 68, though if the season ended today, they’d be returning to a familiar location. As of now, Lunardi has ASU returning to Dayton for the First Four, hypothetically matched up with the Indiana Hoosiers.

Jerry Palm of CBS Sports believes ASU is safer than Dayton, according to his latest bracket. Palm projected the Sun Devils to be a No. 10 seed as of Feb. 2.

Per bracketmatrix.com, a database for projections that uses 100 different brackets to gauge each team’s chances of reaching the NCAA Tournament, 85 out of 104 brackets include the Sun Devils.