Mamma always said, you can’t live off of just junk and the same is true for college basketball teams looking to get high seeds in the NCAA Tournament.
The Notre Dame Fighting Irish can kiss a two-seed officially goodbye. Don’t get me wrong, after the 30-point loss to Duke, a two-seed was already a long-shot, but after a home loss to Syracuse, the best Notre Dame can hope for is a three.
The schedule is of course to blame, as the Irish played a brutally bad non-conference schedule. Nine of their 13 non-ACC foes are currently ranked 200 or below in both the RPI and Ken Pom’s rankings. Six of them are 300 or below (Hartford hovers around that line). I guess feasting on cupcakes like Chicago St. doesn’t pay off like it use to.
The Irish have just two wins over a currently ranked team, Duke and North Carolina, but even that latter one is less impressive as the Tar Heels have dropped five of seven and are at risk to fall out of the top-25.
Overall, the Irish are just 1-1 against the top-25, 5-4 against the top-50 and have just a 8-5 record against top-100 teams. So, not only do they have few impressive wins, they have played just 13 games against the top-100 and 17 against the top-100.
I’ll knock out my NCAA Tournament brackets on Friday, but at best Notre Dame is a third seed and another loss in the regular season and an unimpressive ACC Tournament, Notre Dame could find themselves as the four seed in the Midwest, along with the Kentucky Wildcats.
