LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) — Welcome February. One step closer to the time change, warmer weather and Selection Sunday.
February 1 is the unofficial guidepost to begin daily looks at BracketMatrix.com, a college basketball website that tracks the likely 68-team field for the NCAA Tournament.
This is what the site forecast for Georgia Tech and Louisville, the Atlantic Coast Conference programs that will play at 2 p.m. Monday at the KFC Yum! Center.
The Cards are an 8-seed, parked safely ahead of 15 at-large teams (including North Carolina) that would comprise the field if the teams were picked today.
Georgia Tech has work to do. If you trust the information at BracketMatrix, which is a compilation of 80 brackets, the Yellow Jackets must overtake 12 teams to make the cut.
Translation: Georgia Tech needs this game considerably more than Louisville needs it, if the Yellow Jackets plan to make the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2010.
Louisville is 10-4, losers in three of its last four. Tech is 8-5, losers in two of its last three. The Yellow Jackets started the season with back-to-back ugly losses to Georgia State and Mercer. Those games will be an issue for Tech on Selection Sunday.
But Tech has rallied to win three games against teams (UNC, Clemson and Florida State) likely to make the NCAA field.
In fact, after Tech swatted the Seminoles, 76-65, Saturday, Mark Bradley, the Hall of Fame columnist at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, wrote that Tech will make the NCAA field for the first time under coach Josh Pastner.
Not might.
Will. (Story link.)
Ken Pomeroy’s college basketball analytics website forecasts Louisville winning, 69-66. Bart Torvik’s site likes Louisville 68-67. In Las Vegas, the Cardinals are favored by 4 1/2 points.
Pastner, the coach who followed John Calipari at Memphis before he jumped to Georgia Tech in 2016, made time to answer questions on the ACC teleconference Monday morning after his team’s shoot-around for the Louisville game.
Nothing tricky. Pastner was asked about the challenges of traveling and playing while dealing with the novel coronavirus.
“We had a great win on Saturday with Florida State and then you have a quick turnaround, less than 48 hours, you’re playing Louisville, which is a rescheduled game,” Pastner said.
“Louisville was obviously scheduled to play Boston College on Saturday but that got postponed because of COVID. For this season based on COVID and because of postponements, you’ve just got to be ready whenever the game is called. Whenever it’s kind of played, in a sense.
“There’s not going to be as much competitive equality or balance this year with scheduling just because of COVID. It is what it is and you’ve just got to deal with it …
“… at this point you’re just hoping you get the games and get as many games as you can in … you’ve got to treat every possession or game literally like it’s your last for this season because it could be based on COVID-19 protocols.”
I asked Pastner about the Yellow Jackets’ focus for Louisville.
“I think Chris Mack is one of the best coaches in the country. What he’s done this year. They were good enough to win the national championship last year, I really believe that.
“They lost some guys. But what he’s done with his team this year has been incredible. They’ve bounced back and had a couple of injuries.
“He’s right up there for ACC coach of the year or national coach of the year for what he’s done there with this year’s team at Louisville.
“I think (Carlik) Jones and (David) Johnson are as good of guards as there are in the country.”
Tech’s guards, Jose Alvarado, Michael Devoe and Bubba Parham, are not chumps. Two seniors and a junior (Devoe).
Alvarado and Devoe have made better than 40 percent of their 3-point attempts. As a trio, they have made 53 of 112 shots from distance (47.3 percent) in Tech’s last eight games.
“We’ll have to play our best game of the year if we want to have an opportunity to beat Louisville today,” Pastner said.
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