This week, rather than provide an analysis of W&M’s last two games (don’t remind us), we want to offer our bracket predictions for the 2018 CAA Tournament. It’s been a parity-laden, hard-fought season up to this point, and it’ll continue to be an uphill climb during the Tournament. With just 2-3 games left per team, we at the W&M Sports Blog have compiled our predictions for how the regular season will shake out and ultimately determine the Tournament bracket:
As you can see, #’s 1-4 really shouldn’t surprise anyone, and especially #’s 1-3. Charleston and Northeastern have taken a stranglehold over the #1 and #2 spots, while Hofstra has proven its worth against W&M twice. Elon has experienced a colossal fall from preseason expectations, while UNCW and Drexel seem to be finishing the season strong. But when it’s all said and done, the odds are incredibly high that W&M falls on the wrong side of the bracket, having to face a Towson squad that has beat the Tribe twice this year. But wait, it gets better! The winner of the W&M/Towson game (if it indeed happens) would face the #1-seeded, preseason #1 hometown Charleston Cougars. But don’t lose faith Tribe fans, this Green and Gold team surely has the firepower to knock out any team on any given night.
So for now, we’ll have to wait and see how everyone finishes the year, but we have a feeling that the bracket won’t look all that different when we’re writing about the official 2018 CAA Basketball Tournament bracket next week.
W&M STATISTICS (AS OF FEBRUARY 19, 2018)
- Scoring Offense: 1st in the CAA
84.2 points per game - Field Goal Percentage: 1st
50.8% - Free Throw Percentage: 1st
80% - 3-Point FG Percentage: 1st
43.3% - Assists: 1st
17.6 per game - Scoring Defense: 9th
81.3 - Field Goal PCT Defense: 10th
49%
Despite losing on the road to both Hofstra and Northeastern last week, W&M maintained its strong standing atop most major offensive categories. However, the Tribe (as it has all season long) also maintained its low defensive standings. This late in the season, we likely won’t see any major changes to these numbers; so love it or hate it, this Tribe team is historically great on offense, but historically terrible on defense.
CAA RANKINGS
Charleston has all but locked itself in as the undisputed #1 team in the league. Coming in as the preseason #1’s, the Cougars are looking forward to the CAA Tournament in their home town. Northeastern, a surprise team this year, is close behind; Hofstra and W&M are within one game of each other, and Towson rounds out CAA teams with records at or above .500. It’ll be interesting to see how teams close out the year, as it’s always important to finish strong going into the postseason.
NEXT UP FOR THE 
vs. UNCW, THURSDAY (2/22), 7 PM
vs. Charleston, SATURDAY (2/24), 2 PM
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The William and Mary Sports Blog 
Here’s how I see it. The “Olay” defense on the last play of the Northeastern game that allowed Puscia to score the game winner as the clock ran out was a low. From this low, the Tribe will rise like a Phoenix ( not an Elon Phoenix) from the ashes and win out. The last two at home and three straight in the tournament. Remember, you heard it hear first. Roll Tribe. Let’s hear the lion part of the Griffin roarrrrrrr
On a non-basketball note, CONGRATS to the Tribe men’s swimming-and-no-diving team on their 4TH STRAIGHT CAA championship! And given the swim meet scoring system and the fact that W&M has no divers (and thus gets zero points in the two diving events), the Tribe put a pretty thorough pasting on the other four teams at the CAA meet. Roll Tribe!
I WOULD LIKE TO SEE GLOVER PLAY MORE. HE’S TOUGH ON DEFENSE AND CAN SCORE. PLAY HIM!!!! GIVE THE STARTERS A REST!!