South Dakota State punched its ticket to the NCAA Tournament on Sunday afternoon as the Jackrabbits beat Oral Roberts in the Summit League Tournament championship game. Now, SDSU will have to wait till this upcoming Sunday to find out where it will be headed for March Madness.
This will be the 13th time that the Jackrabbits will hear their name called on Selection Sunday and its the 12th time that they know they are in the tournament for sure.
I went and looked at four different bracket projections and heres where they think Jacks will land come Sunday.
ESPNs Charlie Creme has SDSU as No. 9 seed and playing No. 8 seeded Utah in the first round in Los Angeles. The winner would take on top-seeded USC.
NCAA.coms Autumn Johnson has the Jacks as a No. 9 seed as well and facing No. 8 Illinois in Austin, Tex. The winner would play Texas and that would be a rematch for SDSU as it lost 103-57 to the No. 6 ranked Longhorns on Dec. 22.
Megan Gauer of herhoopstats.com also has SDSU as a No. 9 seed and playing California in Los Angeles. However, she has the winner of that game playing UCLA in the second round.
CBS Sports Connor Groel has the Jacks as a No. 10 seed. He didnt list who the Jacks would play.
SDSU has put together a strong resume with an overall record of 29-3. Despite that stellar record, the Jacks missed out on three wins that could have potentially given them a higher seed.
When you look at SDSUs tournament resume, theres a couple things that jump out. The Jacks are 44th in the NET Rankings, which the committee uses to determine which teams earn at-large bids and where teams are seeded. The Net Rankings take into account game results, strength of schedule, game location, net offensive and defensive efficiency and the quality of wins and losses.
The reason SDSU is 44th in the NET is because the Jacks dont have any quad-one wins. A quad-one win is a win at home against a top-30 team, a win at a neutral site against a top-50 team or win on the road against a top-75 team.
The Jacks three losses came to Duke (seventh in the NET) at home, Georgia Tech (29th) in Hawaii and Texas (third) on the road.
SDSU has three quad-two wins. Those wins came against Creighton at home, Oregon in Hawaii and on the road against Ball State.
The Jacks have been a single-digit seed five other times. Last season, SDSU was a No. 12 seed and that broke a streak of four single-digit seeds in the last four tournament appearances. The Jacks highest came in the 2018-19 season and they were a No. 6 seed. That was the season that SDSU made its lone Sweet 16 appearance.
SDSU has played in an 8/9 game three times and two years ago was the first time it won. The Jacks beat No. 8 seeded USC in overtime in the first round before losing by 15 to top-seeded Virginia Tech in the second round.
SDSU head coach Aaron Johnston was asked about his teams resume after Sundays conference tournament victory and he liked where it was at. However, he did acknowledge where the Jacks stood within the NET and where bracketologists had them projected.
Were sitting here at 29-3, Johnston said. Our non-conference schedule still stands as the 10th-most difficult in the country. We havent had any bumps in the road since we got through that non-conference schedule. This is as good as a team that weve taken to the NCAA Tournament and weve taken some good ones. Its a different year though with bracketology and stuff. NET Rankings, I could talk for a half-whour about how its realy changed things, and I dont know how people are going to weigh that and view that.
As far as what this team is capable of, yeah, I think this team can be as good of a seed as weve had, to be honest. Theyre certainly playing at that level and theyve certainly proved that this year. Well see how everything gets weighted here as they start to plug people into the bracket.
The womens bracket is set to be revealed on Sunday at 7 p.m. You can watch the selection show on ESPN.
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