ASU Basketball: 2019 Pac-12 Week 16 Power Rankings
By Trevor Booth
After another road split, ASU basketball’s margin for error in qualifying for the NCAA Tournament has slimmed entering the final three weeks of Pac-12 play.
If Arizona State is to go dancing in March, it will have to cease its constant two-step in and out of the NCAA Tournament bubble.
The Sun Devils enter the final three weeks of the regular season still without stability, picking up their fifth split of the conference schedule last week. Despite reaching third in the standings, ASU is yet to sweep since its second homestand against the Oregon schools.
According to bracketmatrix.com, the Sun Devils are projected to be a No. 12 seed in 78 of 117 NCAA Tournament bracket projections. This means ASU is balancing the edge of the First Four in Dayton, Ohio, making it likely the team will ‘sweat it out’ come Selection Sunday.
Starting tonight, ASU will have a chance to solidify its at-large resume, but it’ll have to be done against the Stanford Cardinal, a squad that has caught fire with five wins in their last six contests. In the teams’ first meeting on Jan. 12, the Sun Devils couldn’t slow down KZ Okpala and Oscar Da Silva, who combined for 42 points in Stanford’s 85-71 victory.
ASU then faces Cal, which is undoubtedly another low-reward, high-risk game coach Bobby Hurley and his staff must execute around. If the Sun Devils don’t win, this would be a Quadrant IV loss that only a Pac-12 Tournament title could save.
As for the rest of the conference, there’s been nothing to knock the Washington Huskies off as the best team. They were poised in edging in-state foe Washington State on the road, a team that’s gotten hot with Robert Franks back at full health. Colorado is in the midst of a five-game winning streak, and the gap between second and 11th is still only 2.5 games.
Each team will now prepare for the final two weeks of February, where they’ll hope to get hot before the month that counts – March. As tournament seeding becomes more relevant, here’s where we ranked each team in this week’s Power Rankings.