Bubble Watch

In case you missed my big announcement earlier in the week, please check out this post that will explain what all this Selection Sunday stuff is all about. I think this could be really cool if we get a lot of people involved and interacting with one another, so please help spread the word and forward that link! I'll be unveiling the bracket this coming Sunday starting at 5 p.m.

Anyway, I wanted to give out a few more details. I have decided instead of having the higher-seeded teams host games through the first two rounds, I will have neutral sites for every game. I'll put those on the bracket, but you can expect to see a lot of the big cities in Kansas as host cities. It should be a lot of fun.

Also, in the spirit of loving the underdog, I will automatically enter 16 teams from Classes 3A, 2A and 1A. I am excluding Scott City because I feel like it is safely in the field as an at-large team. Class 3A will be represented by Nemeha Valley (19-1), Atchison County (20-0), Humboldt (20-0), Beloit (18-2), Silver Lake (18-2), Phillipsburg (17-1) and Cheney (17-3). Class 2A will be represented by Meade (19-0), Republic County (17-3), Lyndon (18-1), Bennington (19-1) and Marais des Cygnes Valley (18-1). Class 1A will be represented by St. John (19-1), South Haven (18-2), Fowler (20-0) and Central Christian (15-3).

So that brings me to the topic of this post: the Bubble Watch. Since 16 spots are already accounted for in the 64-team tournament, that leaves 48 berths open. From my calculations, I will seriously take a look at 64 teams for those 48 spots.

Click the jump to find out who is already locked into the tournament and who is on my "Bubble Watch."



Here's who I think are firm locks to make my tournaments:

Class 6A (16): BV North, BV Northwest, BV West, Derby, Dodge City, Gardner-Edgerton, Lawrence, Olathe East, Olathe Northwest, Olathe South SM East, SM Northwest, SM West, Wichita East, Wichita Heights & Wichita North.
Class 5A (11): Andover, Andover Central, Bishop Miege, BV Southwest, Emporia, Goddard Eisenhower, KC Washington, Kapaun Mount Carmel, Lansing, Mill Valley & SM South.
Class 4A (6): Andale, Hesston, McPherson, Ottawa, Topeka Highland Park & Wamego.
Class 3A (1): Scott City.

So if you're keeping count at home, that's 34 more spots locked down and leaves 14 open berths available to some combination of the following 30 teams:

Class 6A (8): Blue Valley, Garden City, Hutchinson, Lawrence Free State, Manhattan, Washburn Rural, Wichita Northwest & Wichita Southeast.
Class 5A (9): Bishop Carroll, Hays, KC Harmon, KC Schlagle, Salina Central, St. James Academy, St. Thomas Aquinas, Topeka Seaman & Wichita West.
Class 4A (13): Abilene, Anderson County, Baldwin, Clearwater, Coffeyville, Concordia, El Dorado, Holton, Independence, KC Piper, Labette County, Rock Creek, Wamego & Wichita Trinity.

Which 14 teams from that above group do you think deserve a spot to play for the title? Let me know by leaving a comment below! Or shoot me a Tweet here.