ACC Falls Short Through Two Rounds

For the past several years, the NCAA Tournament selection committee has gone to great lengths to stress they do not consider conferences when awarding spots in the prestigious field of 65. Those sentiments, however, immediately fall upon deaf ears when fans clamor for reasons why their certain sweetheart team didn't make the Big Dance.

This season, it was St. Mary's that was unfairly left out, while the Big Ten and Arizona were the great scapegoats, and the masses fell over themselves to tell us how great the Big East and ACC were. We examined the pre-tournament expectations for each conference last week. In our conference breakdown, we'll check out what the expected record for the conference was to this point, and see how each performed in terms of expectations.

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Slightly Exceeded Expectations

Big 12 -- Expected record: 8-3. Actual record: 9-3. This has, in my opinion, been the most impressive conference in the tournament relative to its seedings. Texas gave Duke a run for its money, and Oklahoma State took Pittsburgh to the wire. The three teams who were supposed to get to the Sweet 16 -- Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma -- did so. Best of all, no one got upset.

Pac-10 -- Expected record: 5-5. Actual record: 6-5. Cal and Washington fell just a tad bit short for the Pac-10, but Arizona made up for it with its Sweet 16 run from a much-maligned berth. The Wildcats are the only remaining team, but considering the highest seed for the conference was a four, this has to be considered a successful Dance for the power conference of the West.

Big Ten -- Expected record: 5-6. Actual record: 6-5. If not for the Illinois stink-bomb, this would have been a rousing success. Two lower seeds won -- Wisconsin and Michigan -- while Purdue took down Washington and made the Sweet 16. Ohio State, a No. 8 seed, lost, but went to two overtimes and lost in dramatic fashion to a solid Siena team. No embarrassment there.

A-10 -- Expected record: 2-2. Actual record: 3-2. Xavier took care of business and Dayton did the conference proud by taking down a strong West Virginia team from the vaunted Big East. The Musketeers can take a huge step in elevating the conference in public perception with an upset over Pitt, who appears ripe for the taking.

Non-power mid-majors -- Expected record: 0-27. Actual record: 3-27. Congratulations Cleveland State, Siena, and Western Kentucky. You did your conferences and fellow "mid-major" brethren proud.

Met Expectations

Memphis/Gonzaga -- Expected record: 4-0. Actual record: 4-0. The power duo from the "non-power" conferences took care of business. It was a bit tougher for Gonzaga than Memphis, but the bottom line is that both are in the Sweet 16. Losses for either could have been catastrophic in terms of public perception of so-called mid-majors.

SEC -- Expected record: 1-3. Actual record: 1-3. LSU held off the Butler Bulldogs, and that was all the SEC was supposed to do in this tournament.

Fell Slightly Short

Big East -- Expected record: 12-2. Actual record: 11-2. Well, it's tough to reach such lofty expectations. The aforementioned West Virginia loss is all that went awry for the Big East. Everyone else took care of business and Marquette went down the wire with Mizzou. On the other hand, top-seeded Pittsburgh hasn't looked the part. We'll see if they get things figured out this coming weekend.

Badly Fell Short

ACC -- Expected record: 9-4. Actual record: 5-5. This was really a dismal showing from a conference full of players and fans who like to pontificate about how much tougher it is than other conferences. Take Greivis Vasquez as the most recent example. He ran his mouth about the ACC, and Memphis thoroughly dismantled Maryland.

There were also analysts talking about how much tougher this league was than the Big Ten and Pac-10, too, which was weird because no one was claiming otherwise. On the court, though, we found reason to dispute. Other than the two powers breezing into the Sweet 16, this conference only won one game. Clemson fell to Michigan (Big Ten, a No. 10 seed), Florida State lost to Wisconsin (Big Ten, 12) and Boston College got beat by USC (Pac-10, 10). Oh, and Wake Forest was embarrassed by Cleveland State of the Horizon League. The Vikings were the highest seed to win a game this season.

I think we need to see a bit more "walk the walk" than just talk, ACC. Chest pounding doesn't mean much when you go out and lay eggs. Duke and UNC can carry the torch, but that does little more than prove it's a two-team conference.

Mountain West -- Expected record: 2-2. Actual record: 0-2. It wasn't so much the two losses, but the manner in which things went down for this conference. The Mountain West constantly tries to fight its way into "major" status, and much of the time it has a case. This year, however, wasn't a step in the right direction. Utah had the chance to prove Arizona didn't belong in the tournament and failed. BYU was completely outplayed early in the game by Texas A&M and never recovered. If you want to prove you belong with the big boys, this was not the result this conference needed.