Gene Smith Spurns Colorado, Cites the Importance of Confidentiality

Ohio State Athletic Director and NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament Selection Committee Chairman Gene Smith has faced considerable criticism for omissions from the newly expanded NCAA tournament field.  The exclusion of the Colorado Buffaloes from the field of 68 has drawn significant ire from varied ESPN personalities including Dick Vitale and Jay Bilas.  Colorado's resume which included a win over a then top 10 Texas team, Missouri, and 3 wins over Kansas State (a 5 seed) has been most frequently compared to the less impressive resumes of UAB (who lost to every tournament team that they faced except VCU) and VCU which were deemed to be tournament worthy. 

           When Smith was faced with this information, he said, "This has been a difficult week for me with everything happening at Ohio State.  This is the first that I heard that Colorado beat Kansas State three times.  One of the committee members apparently has had this information for almost a week but felt that it needed to be kept confidential for the safety of the teams involved and did not bring it to my attention.  It was only after we looked at our brackets due to an unrelated issue that this oversight came to my attention.  We have been trying to cross our t's and dot our i's and frankly the Colorado Buffaloes have neither t's nor i's in their name and Alabama-Birmingham and Virginia Commonwealth had quite a few, so we went with them.  I would apologize but as the Athletic Director at Ohio State that just isn't in my nature."
        There is rampant speculation that the NCAA Tournament Committee Member who suppressed Colorado's quality wins from the Committee was scorned Big 12 Commissioner Dan Beebe.  Beebe's name rose to prominence earlier this year when Nebraska and Colorado's departure from the Big 12 left the conference on the verge of collapse.  When reached for comment, Beebe said "I knew I could use football referees to manipulate the outcome of games, but I never thought I could single-handedly keep a team out of the NCAA tournament.  Good Luck in the Pac 12 and see you in the NIT, Buffs." 

MTK

The New Modified Duke's Criteria: There is one key to being included in the NCAA tournament: Schedule Duke and Lose.  Every team that scheduled Duke, lost to them, and then went on to have a winning regular season and conference record made it into the NCAA tournament with the exception of Virginia Tech and Boston College.  Ironically Virginia Tech is considered one of the most prominent snubs by the selection committee.  Teams that benefitted from loseing to Duke to bolster their tournament bid included:

UAB- most controversial team in the bracket.  Only 1 win against a top-50 RPI team. One of last 4 in

Michigan State-Lost to many great teams (UConn, Texas, Duke,Syracuse). Swept by OSU and Michigan in conference. Beat Wisconsin, Purdue, Washington for high profile wins.  One of 5 teams in tournament with 14 losses (only 6 teams with 14 losses in the last 25 years of tournaments)  

Clemson- One of the last 4 teams in.  Playing a play-in game against another Duke beneficiary UAB

Other teams that met the Modified Duke's Criteria above that were more deserving of their position:

Marquette, St. John's, Butler, Florida State, North Carolina, Temple

This effect is likely largely influenced by RPI.  While the official calculation is not released by the NCAA, it's most simple definition is a calculation consisting of:
25% your winning percentage
50% your opponents average winning percentages
25% your opponents opponents average winning percentages

Therefore 75% of the weighting is completely independant of what your team does.  So schedule Duke and a Big East team or two.  Hold on to win about 20 games and welcome to your 10 seed in Tulsa.