The Tribe Has Spoken

Get ready. It’s time for the home stretch.

I’m leaving the top 5 out of it for the time-being, as 4 of them are playing right now.

6th place…who wants it?

First W&M had the edge, but losses to UDel and UNCW have really killed their advantage. Then Towson looked like they had it locked up, but 2 straight losses have hurt their shot. Right now Towson, William and Mary, and Northeastern are all locked up, so here is how it looks.

Towson, who holds all tie-breakers, has 3 remaining games at home with GSU, JMU, and Drexel. It looks like they will lose one of those, but Tribe fans really need them to drop 2. Also, they play @ODU, which looks like a loss.

Northeastern, who is generally last in the tie-breakers, has 3 remaining road games and only one at home. JMU, GSU, and Delaware are the road teams, but NU is generally bad on the road. They also have GMU at home, and we need them to lose that and possibly 2 more.

W&M has the toughest remaining schedule, with road games at UNCW and Drexel, and Drexel and ODU at home. UNCW is a must win got the Tribe, but the other ones will be tough. They Tribe has to pull one upset to have a legit shot a 6th.

Another thing to throw out there-if GMU loses tonight, these 3 teams will only 1 game behind George Mason. Mason has 2 tough games remaining, so watch out.

Back to the topic at hand…

GSU is currently in 9th place, but probably only has one win left on their schedule. JMU is tied with them, and has a very similar remaining schedule, all against team’s in 8th or higher. If each can pull an upset over NU or TU, who both of them play, we will be in much better shape. UNCW is tied for 11th, and will battle Delaware on the last game of the year for last place.

So, here are the scenarios:

Towson gets 6th with 2 wins, NU gets 7th with 2, and W&M gets 8th with 1

W&M is in 8th place, facing either GSU or JMU in the first round 8/9 game, and get knocks out by VCU in the second round.

W&M wins 2 and gets 6th, NU wins 2 and gets 7th, Towson wins 1 and gets 8th

W&M gets either a 6-man Delaware squad or UNCW in the first round in the 6/11 game, and then faces #3 seed which will either be Hofstra, ODU, or possibly Drexel.

Towson wins 2 and gets 6th, W&M wins 2 and gets 7th, NU wins 2 or 1 and gets 8th

W&M will face the loser of the GSU/JMU standings battle in the 7/10 game, and then faces the 2 seed which will probably be Hofstra.

Final thoughts…

We need to win 2, which will probably get us the 7th seed at the worst. UD and UNCW are really killing us now, as we’d be in the #5 spot with those wins, but either way we need to stay out of 8th and VCU’s bracket.

By the way…There will be no “scouting UNCW” this time, as I wrote one a few days ago. Nothing really should have changed since then.