Villanova Bracketology
Villanova Bracketology: Wildcats Fall Off the Bubble

Villanova suffered their second loss in a row on Tuesday, Jan. 14, blowing a late lead and falling 69-63 to the Xavier Musketeers in Cincinnati.
After upsetting a then-top ten ranked UConn team on Wednesday, Jan. 8, Villanova moved firmly into the NCAA Tournament bubble, occupying the No. 73 spot in the 68-team field per ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi. Since then, two road losses — even worse, losses in extremely winnable Quadrant 1 matchups — have Villanova down to the No. 80 spot, the last team listed in Lunardi’s rankings as part of the “Next” category, one outside his tournament bubble.
— Joe Lunardi (@ESPNLunardi) January 15, 2025
Villanova’s Case… Or Lack Thereof
The Wildcats possess matching 1-4 records on the road and in Quad 1 games; 2-1 in Quad 2, 2-2 in Quad 3 and 6-0 in Quad 4. Strength of schedule isn’t doing the Wildcats any favors either, as a previous Quad 1 win over Cincinnati (and a Quad 2 loss to St. Joseph’s) both dropped down a category as those teams began their own slides down the NET rankings. As of the conclusion of games played on Jan. 14, Villanova sits at No. 54 per the NET system and No. 48 in the KenPom ratings… but those don’t account for the 32 tournament auto bids taken up by conference tournament winners.
Now more than halfway through their 31 game schedule, Villanova is running out of chances to make their case for an NCAA Tournament bid: with a 25.4 percent chance of qualifying for the Big Dance according to teamrankings.com, they aren’t yet dead in the water… but need to turn things around in a hurry if they want to make the tournament for the first time in head coach Kyle Neptune’s tenure.
Their next chance to get back in the win column starts at 7 p.m. on Friday, Jan. 17 when they host Providence at Philadelphia’s Wells Fargo Center.