Are you interested in knowing what Thursday, January 8, represents on the college basketball calendar? It’s day 67, right in the middle of the regular season.
We have 66 days of college basketball from November 3 to January 7, and 66 more from January 9 to Selection Sunday. Considering the conference season has only just begun, it seems like there’s still plenty of time for mid-sized conference universities to prepare their NCAA Tournament plans, right?
Mistaken.
In most cases, it is already too late. Teams build their reputation during the first half and then maintain it in the second.
This is what we mean.
Let’s go back to January 9, 2025, which was the halfway point of last season.
Let’s review the NET ranking at dawn that day:
- Chestnut
- Duque
- Tennessee
- Houston
- Florida
Eh.
There go our four No. 1 seeds (and our field for the Final Four) and the No. 6 seed overall (Tennessee).
As we move forward, we need to get all the way to No. 20 Pitt to find a team that didn’t qualify for the 2025 NCAA Tournament, and the Panthers needed a historic collapse to do that. Starting with a January 7 loss to Duke, they have lost 13 of their last 18 games.
As we continue to scroll, we can find just four or five more schools that we can suggest made it out of the tournament:
No. 30 Ohio State (which suffered a 2-point home loss to Oregon on Midpoint Day to spark a 7-10 finish)
No. 34 West Virginia (a bubble team that had a good case for a bid)
No. 35 Cincinnati (which was 8-11 after Midpoint Day)
No. 38 Nebraska (lost six of its last seven games and missed the Big Ten tournament entirely, causing the league to change its rules and let everyone in this year)
And maybe No. 45 SMU (damned by the ACC’s pettiness)
If we agree that those five teams left during the second half of the season, then who left in?
No. 67 New Mexico (which won the Mountain West regular season crown)
No. 66 Xavier (won its last seven regular season games)
No. 57 Creighton (won its first nine games after Midpoint Day)
No. 48 BYU (won last eight regular season games)
No. 47 Arkansas and No. 46 Oklahoma (both part of the historically impressive SEC)
(By the way, this wasn’t just a 2025 thing. On the morning of January 11, 2024, you have to scroll all the way to No. 23 Oklahoma to find the first team in the NET rankings that doesn’t qualify for the NCAA. On the morning of January 9, 2023, No. 14 Ohio State and No. 20 Rutgers, which suffered a major injury, were the top two teams that didn’t qualified for the NCAA).
So what’s the lesson here, besides maybe not being like Ohio State?
The top 20 teams in the NET, as of Thursday morning, should feel pretty good about their chances of making the NCAA Tournament. This isn’t a huge revelation for major conference schools, but it’s a positive for No. 20 Utah State (13-1).
The second 20 teams should feel pretty good as well. As long as teams like No. 29 Saint Louis (13-1 entering Wednesday night’s game against VCU) don’t make big mistakes in the second half, they can start making plans for March Madness.
But there’s no way Saint Louis coach Josh Schertz will read this and believe the Billikens are almost on the way toward its first NCAA bid since 2019.
Why not?
Because on Selection Sunday 2024, Schertz’s Indiana State Sycamores were ranked No. 28 in the NET, up seven spots since Midpoint Day. They had a record of 28-6. They lost the Missouri Valley Conference championship game by just 4 points.
And they were scammed.
So all the teams between 20th and 40th in the current NET? Feel free to continue winning in the second half.
You know, just in case this theory isn’t foolproof.
