By Mel Greenberg
This is a very short exercise for lack of other things to do on a Friday night.
The following is a rough cut to identify how big the so-called bubble group will be versus the amount of forecasted total of open slots for at-large teams in the NCAA women's tournament field.
We'll do this every so often the next two weeks and changes can be made. The "lock" list now includes slots for conference automatic qualifiers from leagues likely to send just one team. For now, it will be whomever the leader is at the close of business prior to a particular post.
So change can occur.
Once the real conference tournaments are decided, we'll add to the bubble mix any perceived winner that dominated the regular season but got upset.
We will not identify a particular forecasted conference winner in the major conferences because it is not necessary for this particular exercise on this particular date.
Some teams we'll refrain from placing in the lock category because they may not be so in the combined private thinking of the committee at the moment, even if we like them. As it is, many of those types are still likely to make the field of 64 in the 33 at-large slots. So this is just a roll call of sorts and nothing more.
But feel free to discuss among yourselves as many of you did during our recent "insiders" guide during the "mock tournament committee sessions" in Indianapolis.
Incidentally, we're only using the conference standings to identify teams, not number of representatives.
The Locks (52):
North Carolina
Maryland
Duke
Virginia
*America East - Hartford
George Washington
*Atlantic Sun - East Tennessee St.
Ohio State
Kansas St
Baylor
Oklahoma
Oklahoma St.
Nebraska
Texas A&M
Texas
Connecticut
Rutgers
West Virginia
Pittsburgh
Notre Dame
Syracuse
Louisville
*Big West - UCSB
*Big Sky - Montana
*Big South - Liberty
Old Dominion
UTEP
*Horizon - Wis.-Green Bay
*Ivy - Cornell
*Metro Atlantic - Marist
*MEAC - N.Carolina A&T
*Mid-American winner
*Summit - South Dakota St.
*Missouri Valley - Illinois St.
Utah
*Northeast Conference - Quinnipiac
*Ohio Valley - SE Missouri
Stanford
California
Arizona State
*Patriot - Army
*Sun Belt - W. Kentucky
LSU
Tennessee
Vanderbilt
Georgia
Auburn
*Southland - Texas State
*Southern - Chattanooga
*SWAC winner
*Western Athletic - Fresno St.
*West Coast - Gonzaga
The Bubbles (17 --for 12 slots if the above becomes accurate)
Note: Some teams in this comparisons are obvious stronger than others.
This means that if the above holds firm with no wrong winners in perceived one-team conferences, it is not so large a bubble in which only five of the below must be sliced to produce the remaining at-large OR conversely the best 12 must be picked from the same group. This list will change as we go. We might like some teams a week from now we didn't mention in this first go-round. And we might also cut others that are currently listed below.
Florida State
Georgia Tech
Boston College
Xavier
Temple
Iowa
Purdue
Minnesota
Iowa State
DePaul
James Madison
TCU
Wyoming
Southern Cal
Middle Tennessee St.
Florida
Kentucky
--Mel
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