NCAA Tournament March Madness

#126 UC Irvine

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Projection: need to automatically qualify

UC Irvine’s résumé reads as a mixture of upside and damaging inconsistency, with solid neutral-site tournament wins and road victories like the one at San Jose State showcasing the program’s ability to win away from home, while ugly results at home to Cal Baptist and Belmont and a poor neutral outing at New Mexico State leave lasting blemishes. Tight losses at Utah Valley and Northern Iowa show the team can hang with better opposition but also highlight missed chances that a committee will remember. The remainder of the Big West schedule supplies plenty of repair opportunities with home dates against CS Bakersfield and CS Fullerton and other winnable conference matchups, yet tough trips to Hawaii and UC Davis represent tests that will be judged more harshly. In short, the defense of the profile rests on those quality road and neutral victories, but the severity of a few bad losses and continued inconsistency mean the margin for error down the stretch is very small.

Date Opponent Ranking Outcome
11/7Cal Baptist141L69-61
11/15Weber St215W79-70
11/19@Utah Valley97L79-72
11/22Northern Iowa87L70-69
11/25(N)New Mexico St146L57-45
11/26(N)S Dakota St184W64-52
11/30@San Jose St194W72-63
12/4UC Riverside282W73-60
12/6CS Northridge197W85-71
12/19Belmont75L84-58
12/21(N)N Dakota St147W74-73
12/22(N)Norfolk St285W89-70
1/1@CS Bakersfield294W81-77
1/3@CS Fullerton234W86-64
1/8Long Beach St24083%
1/10@Hawaii9527%
1/11@Hawaii9527%
1/17@UC Davis17150%
1/22@UC Riverside28272%
1/24@UC San Diego9226%
1/29Hawaii9549%
2/5CS Bakersfield29489%
2/7@UC Santa Barbara16549%
2/12@Cal Poly23763%
2/14CS Fullerton23481%
2/19@Long Beach St24065%
2/21UC San Diego9247%
2/26@CS Northridge19756%
2/28UC Santa Barbara16571%
3/5Cal Poly23782%
3/7UC Davis17172%