NCAA Tournament March Madness

#248 American Univ

Bubble Watch | Bracketology

Chat with the Bracketologist | How does this work?


Projection: need to automatically qualify

American’s résumé simply does not contain the kind of signature wins or sustained road success that earns an at-large ticket, so their path to the Big Dance runs through the Patriot League title. Their best moments are respectable but limited, a home victory over Penn and a gritty road win at Boston University plus a home win over Colgate that showed they can close tight games, but those highlights are outweighed by damaging results away from home against power conference opponents and stronger midmajors such as George Washington, VCU, Virginia and Rutgers where they were soundly beaten. Late season slip-ups against peer league opponents including Bucknell, Lafayette and Loyola Maryland eroded any resume momentum and left them with too few wins in resume-building locations. With remaining regular season games at Bucknell and Lafayette and a manageable stretch against Lehigh and Boston University there are opportunities to steady the ship, but without a marquee nonconference scalp or more consistent neutral-site success the committee will view them as needing the automatic berth.

Date Opponent Ranking Outcome
11/3@Wake Forest72L88-74
11/9Penn174W84-78
11/12@G Washington76L107-67
11/18@Rutgers161L80-71
11/28Maine349W74-61
11/29Siena199L59-55
11/30Longwood284W92-66
12/3Drexel228W75-73
12/6MD E Shore339W78-60
12/18@VCU46L105-83
12/22@Virginia20L95-51
12/31Loyola MD315W84-69
1/3@Boston Univ281W64-62
1/7@Colgate213L64-62
1/10Holy Cross328L84-73
1/12Navy158W65-51
1/18@Army338W78-67
1/21Colgate213W70-66
1/24@Holy Cross328W76-67
1/28@Loyola MD315L77-68
1/31Lafayette327L67-65
2/4Bucknell331L60-59
2/7@Navy158L82-73
2/11@Lehigh300L90-82
2/14Army338W75-63
2/18@Bucknell33161%
2/22@Lafayette32759%
2/25Lehigh30072%
2/28Boston Univ28168%