It’s finally March and that means tournament time in college basketball.  It also means teams across the country are sweating out life inside the bubble, and whether or not they will get a coveted invite to the NCAA tournament.  Every game becomes almost a do-or-die proposition.

The final at-large bids in the tournament field are typically seeded either 11th or 12th every year meaning they would square off against a 5- or 6-seed in the first round.  AccuScore pitted eight teams squarely on the bubble against two teams that are representative of a likely first-round opponent in Marquette and Purdue.  This was done in order to measure the chances these teams could potentially win a game should they receive a bid to the Big Dance.

Today we have the Kentucky Wildcats fresh off their huge win over Florida:

Kentucky
Southeastern Conference
18-11 overall; 12-4 in conference
RPI:    48
SOS:   12

Despite a disastrous non-conference slate that included home losses to Gardner-Webb and San Diego it appears that Kentucky is poised to make yet another appearance in the NCAA tournament.  The Wildcats defeated fellow bubble team Florida on Sunday in a critical match-up that likely put them over the top.  Twelve wins in the SEC simply cannot be overlooked.

This team endured a stretch of eight losses in 11 games in December and January as it took awhile for the players to completely buy in to what Coach Billy Gillespie was preaching.  When they finally did however, their play took off as they finished the regular season winning 11 of 13 games with losses coming only against nationally ranked Vanderbilt and Tennessee on the road.

The recovery of the Wildcats has been all the more impressive when factoring in the season ending injury to freshman post Patrick Patterson.  Recently named the SEC Freshman of the Year (along with Florida’s Nick Calathes) despite missing the final three games, Patterson had been the sole inside presence for Kentucky.  Despite his absence the Wildcats took Tennessee down to the wire on the road, and beat both South Carolina and Florida.  Sophomore Perry Stevenson has stepped in for Patterson, and while he has the height at 6’9’’ to play inside he weighs in at less than 200 pounds.  That lack of bulk has not stopped him from averaging 11 points, 7 rebounds, and 3 blocks over the past three games.

As the numbers against Marquette and Purdue suggest, Kentucky has not collapsed as many expected without Patterson in the lineup.  Stevenson’s inspired play has a lot to do with this.  The numbers also show that the Wildcats are fully capable of pulling off a first round upset in two weeks whoever their opponent might be.  A year of ups and downs battling through injuries and a coaching change has appeared to galvanize this team for the better.