Thursday Projections of the Final Conference Standings

[ZifCat52]

Here are the projected winners for Thursday's games in the Big Sky and the projections of the final standings after next weekend.

Northern Arizona over MSU

Montana over Sac State @ Sacramento

Portland State over Idaho State

Eastern over Weber State


Final Confernece Standings Projection

Montana State 11 / 3
Portland State 10 / 4
Montana 9 / 5
Eastern Washington 6 / 8
Weber State 6 / 8
Northern Arizona 6 / 8
Sacramento State 5 / 9
Idaho State 3 / 11

MSU and PSU have qualified for the confernece tourney and both control their own destiny for winning the conference. The Griz's magic number is 1 for getting into the tourney, and still has a slim chance to win the confernece (UM would have to win all its remaining games, Portland State would have to lose all its remaining games, MSU would have to lose 3 of 4 with the only win being against PSU). The Griz should be the #3 seed and get a home game in the tourney. Weber, Eastern, NAU, and Sac St all are in must win situations to stay in the hunt for the bottom three spots in the tourney and the other home torunament game. ISU is projected to lose all its remaining games, all on the road, and will likely not make the tourney this year.

Note that MSU is projected to lose @ NAU, then beat Sac St (I believe that if the Cats win only one on this roadtrip, the more likely target is NAU). NAU is projected to win all its remaining conference games, all at home. PSU is projected to lose to both MSU and UM next weekend. Everyone except NAU has at least one road game left on their schedule. Sac St is projected to lose both of its final home games (UM and MSU), then lose to NAU at Flagstaff.

On Friday, I will have projections for the Bracket Buster games for NAU, PSU, and Weber, along with updates for the other conference games on Saturday.

[Barnbat]

Thanks for the projections. NAU, SAC, MSU, and UM are real hard to project on Thursday for sure. I do not know where the projection of Montana over SAC comes from. NAU over MSU ?? Road loss?? I would think the projections for these two games would be reversed based on the season so far. I do not think they are predictable or projectable until about 10 pm thursday. But thanks for somebody trying.