March 5 Update

First, I better acknowledge that I left Ohio State off last time around. Oops. No, I'm not a closet Michigan fan (I'm actually neutral and just root for good games when they play). Just a mistake.

I've started to put the auto-bids in CAPS and highlighted in blue now, though I can already see that I forgot to show Michigan that way. No, I'm not a closet Ohio State fan (neutral, remember?).

In my efforts to project these brackets, I'm trying to keep in mind some past trends. One of those trends is that teams outside the top six or seven conferences rarely get the seeding we think they will (usually lower). So with Rhode Island's recent losses even before the A-10 tourney, I felt like the committee will overreact and drop them more than I would, so their 7-seed reflects that more than my personal opinion (I think they should be a 6). Same goes for St. Mary's - I think they deserve to be on the 8/9 line but I can't see the committee agreeing. Now, I did bump Bonaventure up to a 10 and that does run counter to this line of thinking, but I just couldn't put the teams behind them ahead of them at this point. Bona's going to give some team a really hard time next week. I think they can hold that 10 if they win the A-10 but will probably end up a 11. I hope they avoid the PiG.

I kept MTSU at the 11 line despite their loss, but they're another one that I won't be surprised to see relegated to a 5/12 game. They better win their tourney. Leaving decisions like this in the hands of the committee doesn't usually end well for mid-majors.

Hoping to put up one or two more projection (maybe on Wednesday and again on Friday, after a few more games are in the books) before submitting my "final exam" to the Bracket Matrix on Sunday afternoon.