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MAC Women's Basketball Tournament: Projecting The Seeds, Sifting Through Tiebreakers

The men's basketball teams have two sets of games left

The current MAC women's basketball standings, division agnostic:

1. 13-2 Bowling Green (wins head-to-head tiebreak over EMU)
2. 13-2 Eastern Michigan
3. 12-3 Toledo
4. 10-5 Miami
5. 7-8 Central Michigan
6. 6-9 Northern Illinois (wins head-to-head tiebreak over OHIO and Akron)
7. 6-9 OHIO (wins tiebreak over Akron based on win over No. 1 seed)
8. 6-9 Akron
9. 5-10 Kent State
10. 4-11 Western Michigan (wins head-to-head tiebreak over Buffalo and Ball State)
11. 4-11 Buffalo (wins head-to-head tiebreak over Ball State)
12. 4-11 Ball State

Now that's not exactly how it's going to shake down. Only one seed is decided and the rest are in flux, especially those last eight seeds. So let's try to figure it out, using the official tiebreaking system:

The final set o' games on Wednesday, February 28:

Buffalo at Akron
Toledo at Ball State
Eastern Michigan at Central Michigan
Bowling Green at Kent State
OHIO at Miami
Western Michigan at Northern Illinois

BGSU:
1-seed with a win
1-seed with a loss, an EMU loss and a Toledo loss
2-seed with a loss, an EMU loss and a Toledo win
3-seed with a loss, an EMU win and a Toledo win

EMU:
1-seed with a win, a BGSU loss and a Toledo loss
Otherwise: 2-seed

Toledo:
2-seed with a win, a BGSU loss and an EMU win
Otherwise: 3-seed

Miami:
locked in as a 4-seed

CMU:
5-seed with a win
5-seed with a loss and an Akron loss
6-seed with a loss, an NIU loss, an OHIO loss and an Akron win

After that … it gets hazy. Basically WMU, Buffalo and Ball State are all locked into first-round road games. KSU needs a win and a loss from NIU, OHIO and Akron. John Wagner did the unthinkable and tried to break down all those possible tiebreakers in the heap of teams at the bottom. Honestly the last eight teams are mostly interchangeable, but CMU is the most dangerous of them all.

If I were a more ambitious man with high mathematical acuity, I'd break it all down too.

But I'm lazy. So I'll just project based on who I think wins Wednesdays games. It's easier!

GUESSES:
Akron beats Buffalo
Toledo beats Ball State
Eastern Michigan beats Central Michigan
Bowling Green beats Kent State
Miami beats OHIO
NIU beats Western Michigan

If this happens, it puts the seeds thusly:

1. 14-2 Bowling Green
2. 14-2 Eastern Michigan
3. 13-3 Toledo
4. 11-5 Miami
5. 7-9 Central Michigan (wins tiebreak of aggregate record over NIU and Akron)
6. 7-9 Northern Illinois (wins tiebreak of head-to-head record over Akron)
7. 7-9 Akron
8. 6-8 OHIO
9. 5-11 Kent State
10. 4-12 Western Michigan
11. 4-12 Buffalo
12. 4-12 Ball State

This would make the first round games:

12. Ball State at 5. Central Michigan
11. Buffalo at 6. Northern Illinois (sorry about the airfare, UB)
10. Western Michigan at 7. Akron
9. Kent State at 8. OHIO

In all truth, the first-round games may be competitive and close but will lack a high level of competition of tournament games until presumably the quarters/semis, when the Big Four finally break into action out in Cleveland. But they will help sort out the teams brandishing the nametags that display "SPOILER."