From now until Selection Sunday, the only thing the Arkansas Razorbacks (20-13, 8-10 SEC) can do is wait, as the Hogs lost in stunning fashion to Ole Miss on a last-second three in the second round of the SEC Tournament in Nashville, Tennessee, on Thursday.
Despite the loss, all signs point to the Razorbacks hearing their name called by the NCAA Tournament committee, which will unveil the 68-team bracket Sunday at 5 p.m. CT. As of March 13, BracketMatrix shows 106 brackets have Arkansas as either a 9, 10 or 11-seed in this year's Big Dance, with one outlier showing the Hogs as a 12-seed.
While the general consensus is that the Hogs will go dancing, Arkansas head coach John Calipari seemed a little less confident. At least, that's how he tried to put it in his postgame press conference Thursday afternoon.
"Hopefully we've done enough and done enough in this league," Calipari said. "You're playing the 1-ranked, 2-ranked. You're doing the things that we've done. I think we've proven it. I'm not in the room. I don't know what's happening around the country because I haven't watched. I don't have any idea who's doing what right now. I was focusing on this game."
The coach on the opposite bench Thursday, Ole Miss' Chris Beard, believes the Hogs are good enough for the Big Dance.
"Arkansas had won five of their last six or six of their last seven," Beard said postgame. "To me, it was maybe kind of a second weekend-type game. A talented team...we wish those guys the best of luck in the NCAA tournament. A lot of respect for Coach Cal. A really good win if our team.
"I don't view this as the first game in Nashville. I view this as we competed with a team that has second-weekend NCAA tournament written all over 'em."
Arkansas' resume won't compete for a spot in the top half of the bracket, but it's definitely one of the best compared to bubble teams. Right now, the Hogs sit at No. 39 in the NET rankings with a 9-12 Quad 1/2 record and no losses in Quads 3 or 4.
The NET rankings aren't the only metric used for by the tournament committee, though. Here's a full list of what they look at, and where Arkansas ranks:
KPI: 39
WAB: 43
NET: 39
KenPom: 40
BartTorvik: 43
BPI: 44
SOR: 45
The tournament committee uses both resume and predictive metrics to evaluate the quality of teams. The predictive metrics are BartTorvik, BPI and KenPom, while the resume metrics are WAB (wins above bubble), Kevin Pauga Index (KPI) and strength of record. Torvik has been around for a while, but this is the first season it will be added to team sheets for the committee.
Usually, the predictive and resume metrics are weighted close to 50-50. However, it's impossible to know for certain how the committee will favor one team over another until the bracket is revealed Sunday.
There's still a lot that has to happen, though at the moment it doesn't feel like there's much skepticism about Arkansas' place in the tournament. ESPN's Joe Lunardi still has the Razorbacks in the tournament as the top team in his "Last Four Byes" section.
There is a nightmare timeline where Arkansas doesn't make it, but it would require an insane amount of bid-stealers — that is, teams winning their conference tournaments to earn a bid when they wouldn't have gotten an at-large selection otherwise — and even then, Arkansas would still have to feel somewhat good about its chances based on its resume.
What's helping the Razorbacks is their total body of work throughout the season. Despite losing their first five games of Southeastern Conference play, the Hogs have marquee wins over Michigan at Madison Square Garden, on the road at Kentucky, Texas and Vanderbilt, and at home against Missouri and Mississippi State.
"In non-conference, we played probably four or five or six teams that will be in the NCAA tournament out of those 13," Calipari said. "Then the games we played against this league, I mean, you tell me how many of these teams are going to be in.
"This team has proven it all year. They've made me proud. I told 'em, this is one of the most rewarding years that I've had. Some of 'em may get mad, What about this year? What about that year? I'm talking for me as a coach. All that we were up against, these kids never stopped, they just kept coming. It was great to see."
But the committee is fickle, as humans tend to be, so while Arkansas fans can feel confident, there's still a sliver of a chance they end up disappointed. And with no games left for the Hogs to prove they belong, the only one they can play now is the waiting one.
