2012 Conference Tournament Predictions: Pac-12, Conference USA, WAC & SWAC

March 6, 2012 - by David Hess

Throughout the 2012 college basketball conference tournament season, we’ll be using the same projection engine that drives our college basketball season projections to predict the outcome of every conference tournament.

This post covers expected round-by-round advancement odds for the 2012 Pac-12 Bracket, the 2012 C-USA Bracket, the 2012 WAC Bracket, and the 2012 SWAC Bracket.

For similar breakdowns of other conference tournaments, please see our 2012 college basketball conference tournament projections overview blog post.

2012 Pac-12 Tournament Round-By-Round Advancement Odds

Seed	Team	Quarter	Semi	Champ	Win
2	California	100.00%	71.63%	47.89%	30.26%
4	Arizona	100.00%	60.68%	34.96%	17.28%
1	Washington	100.00%	66.45%	33.55%	15.81%
3	Oregon	100.00%	64.43%	27.19%	13.69%
5	UCLA	86.74%	38.12%	19.69%	8.54%
7	Stanford	83.02%	27.27%	13.65%	6.31%
6	Colorado	91.11%	35.18%	11.07%	4.31%
9	Oregon St	58.83%	21.79%	8.19%	2.83%
8	Wash State	41.18%	11.76%	3.44%	0.92%
10	Arizona St	16.98%	1.10%	0.19%	0.03%
12	USC	13.26%	1.20%	0.17%	0.02%
11	Utah	8.89%	0.40%	0.01%	0.00%

Everyone makes fun of the Pac-12 for being down this year, but don’t let that scare you away from this tournament. Because the teams at the top of the league couldn’t separate themselves from the pack, the seedings have almost no correlation to which teams are actually most likely to win. According to leading sportsbooks, the top two favorites are #2 California and #5 UCLA, while according to our predictions they are #2 California and #4 Arizona. Even #9 Oregon State has around a 3% chance to win — not great, but not completely out of the picture.

Because of the jumbled nature of the Pac-12, this is one of the rare cases where our predicted win odds differ enough from the gambling market that there appears to be a couple teams with a bit of value.

First, we give #2 California a 30.3% chance to win emerge from the Pac-12 bracket, while their odds are +245, which works out to a 29.0% break-even win rate. That’s only a projected return on investment (ROI) of +4%, but at least it’s positive.

The other potential value here appears to be #4 Arizona. Their odds to win the tournament at leading sportsbooks are +675, which means they’d need to have a greater than 12.9% chance of winning in order for the bet to be profitable over the long term. Our predictions peg them with 17.3% odds, well over the break-even rate. That projects to a +34% ROI.

2012 Conference USA Tournament Round-By-Round Advancement Odds

Seed	Team	Quarter	Semi	Champ	Win
1	Memphis	100.00%	95.44%	83.53%	70.94%
2	S Mississippi	100.00%	73.23%	45.37%	12.09%
4	Central FL	100.00%	66.18%	11.82%	6.02%
3	Tulsa	100.00%	54.28%	24.46%	4.44%
6	Marshall	74.01%	38.54%	18.16%	3.58%
5	UAB	70.17%	27.48%	2.81%	1.13%
7	Rice	53.58%	15.06%	6.00%	0.69%
8	TX El Paso	59.95%	3.41%	1.29%	0.44%
10	E Carolina	46.42%	11.71%	4.24%	0.42%
11	S Methodist	25.99%	7.19%	1.76%	0.12%
9	Houston	40.05%	1.15%	0.33%	0.08%
12	Tulane	29.83%	6.34%	0.23%	0.05%

It’s clear that Memphis is the best team in Conference USA, plus the Tigers get the benefit of home field advantage during the conference tournament. So it’s not a question of whether Memphis is the favorite, just how huge of a favorite they are. Our predictions give them a 70.9% chance to win the C-USA title, while their odds at leading sportsbooks are -230, which works out to a 69.7% break even point. The difference between those numbers means we project them with a +2% ROI. That’s not much, and well within the margin of error. But it at least means that rabid Memphis fans should feel like they are throwing their money away if they back the Tigers to cut down the nets.

Southern Miss is the only team besides Memphis that doesn’t absolutely need to win the Conference USA tournament to ensure themselves a spot in the NCAA tournament. The Golden Eagles are currently projected at around a #9 or #10 seed, so they should make it even if they stumble in the first round. They probably shouldn’t feel completely safe unless they reach the final, though. The rest of C-USA had better lace their sneakers up tight, because it’s win out or go home.

2012 WAC Tournament Round-By-Round Advancement Odds

Seed	Team	Semi	Champ	Win
1	Nevada	89.52%	63.79%	36.64%
2	N Mex State	79.59%	59.88%	36.39%
4	Utah State	64.93%	24.52%	10.04%
3	Idaho	64.32%	22.61%	8.95%
7	Fresno St	20.41%	9.09%	2.75%
5	LA Tech	35.07%	8.88%	2.49%
6	Hawaii	35.68%	8.42%	2.28%
8	San Jose St	10.48%	2.82%	0.46%

Despite winning the WAC by three games, our predictive ratings actually see Nevada as slightly worse than second-place New Mexico State. That’s mostly due to nonconference play, where NMSU split a home and home series with New Mexico, and stayed within single digits in all their other losses. Nevada, on the other hand, lost their BracketBusters game to likely non-tournament team Iona, was beating soundly by BYU, and their best win was probably Washington.

Of course, being the #1 seed in the WAC means that Nevada faces an easier path to the conference tournament title, so the Wolf Pack are still the favorites to win the title — barely. They have only a 0.2% edge over the Aggies, which essentially means you should flip a coin.

2012 SWAC Tournament Round-By-Round Advancement Odds

Seed	Team	Semi	Champ	Win
1	Miss Val St	89.25%	72.97%	53.69%
2	TX Southern	80.65%	57.26%	25.27%
3	Prairie View	64.59%	25.75%	7.61%
4	Alabama St	53.13%	12.69%	5.28%
5	Ark Pine Bl	46.87%	10.12%	3.91%
6	Alcorn State	35.41%	9.63%	1.75%
8	Jackson St	10.75%	4.23%	1.30%
7	Alab A&M	19.35%	7.36%	1.19%

Somewhat amusingly, the SWAC — which is by far the worst conference in Division I, and compiled an 0-42 record against the top 100 of our predictive power ratings — may just have the flashiest conference tournament website in the land. It advertises a comedy show; that outside entertainment is probably necessary to draw fans when the league’s prohibitive favorite, Mississippi Valley State, went 1-11 in nonconference play.