Resume comparison: Feb. 3

Two teams.

One a possible paper tiger.

The other pretty much an afterthought at this stage.

How do they stack up? Let's take a look, courtesy of data via Collegerpi.com

Team A	Category	Team B
16-6	W-L	13-8
42	RPI	59
1-1	T25	2-5
1-3	T50	3-6
2-5	T100	4-6
6-0	200+	6-0
6-5	Road	1-5
6-5	R + N	3-6
76	SOS	26
5-3	Conference	4-5
@Wyoming (198)	100+ losses	N.C. State (107) @DePaul (139)

Team A has a better record, a better RPI and a vastly better profile on the road.

Team B has beaten more good teams and has a stronger schedule strength.

But let's delve deeper.

Two of Team B's three wins away from home came against top-50 opponents. Team A is 0-4 on the road against top-100 opponents.

Team B has a couple dubious losses, but Team A's bad loss is significantly worse.

The absolute best thing Team A has done --- other than beating a top-25 team --- is avoid playing lousy opponents. Only three of its nonconference opponents rank outside the top 200, and it is helping prop up the RPI.

I'd like to think this is a dead heat. But it isn't. Despite its flaws (and the apparent disparity in road and neutral records), Team B has actually beaten some decent teams in less than hospitable settings. Team A hasn't. Sure, that loss at DePaul is horrendous, but it's not even as bad as losing at Wyoming.

In this case, take Team B is the better options. Either way, if one of these teams had to be included, they probably would be gone before the end of the first round.

Who are the mystery teams?  Scroll down.

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Team A is

(SAN DIEGO STATE)

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And Team B is

(MARQUETTE)

San Diego State is on the fringes of tournament discussions. But unless it can win at New Mexico (Saturday) or Brigham Young (Feb. 24), it's hard to envision the Aztecs building the necessary profile to get in as an at-large team.

As for the Golden Eagles, they're done with the guts of Big East play. Eight of their last nine games are against top-100 teams, but just one is against a top-40 team.

That means there's an opportunity to recover and look a little better vis-a-vis the rest of the bubble and collect some solid victories to complement defeats of Xavier and Georgetown.

For now, Marquette already compares favorably to at least one barely borderline team in the discussion.

Comments

[YANCSSB]

Marquette has had some very close, heartbreaking losses to some very good teams. Their eight losses are by a combined 25 points, including three one-point losses to FSU, WVU and Depaul, and two two-point losses to Villanova. They're 17th in the Pomeroy Ratings.

Everytime I get down thinking about what might've been had State closed the deal on Florida and Arizona, I just look at Marquette and feel better.

[D1scourse]

Yep, Marquette is highly, highly unfortunate. Theres even an absence of luck in that Connecticut and Michigan have struggled so much. Those wins would have been coveted in the preseason.

Theres still time for a turnaround. A 2-8 record in games decided by less than 10 points is flukish, and the schedule is inviting. Going 6-3 the rest of the way gets Marquette in the discussion for sure. Going 7-2 (to get to 20-10, 11-7 Big East) will make the Golden Eagles hard to ignore.