Villanova Bracketology: At-Large Bid Off Table for Wildcats

Villanova Men’s Basketball’s chances of an at-large bid in the NCAA Tournament dwindled near zero in the wake of their 66-59 loss to UConn on Tuesday, Feb. 18.

The Wildcats led the Huskies 53-39 with 12 minutes to play in the second half, in excellent position to pick up a Quadrant 1 win on the road, before making just two of 15 shots to close out the game, unraveling in catastrophic fashion.

With a 15-12 record (8-8 Big East) and just four games to play in the regular season, if the Wildcats have any hopes of reaching the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2022, they’ll need a Big East Tournament championship to do so: per teamrankings.com, Villanova’s odds of an at-large bid are down to 0.8 percent.

While the Quad 1 loss ended up little more than a slap on the wrist — the Wildcats remained at No. 54 in the NET rankings and No. 55 in the KenPom ratings, the spots they occupied heading into Tuesday’s game — the simple fact is that Villanova is out of time. A 1-6 record in Quad 1 matchups and 5-3 in Quad 2 games simply isn’t going to cut it… especially when coupled with 3-2 and 6-1 records in Quadrants 3 and 4, respectively.