3 Teams That Can Still Save Their Disappointing Seasons and Make NCAA Tournament

The regular season is drawing to a close and the NCAA Tournament is right around the corner with some teams looking to play themselves into the field of 68.

Several teams started slow this season, for a myriad of different reasons, but are trying to make one last push at the Tournament. A few teams in particular have fallen short of lofty goals set by themselves and the public before the season but still have a chance of making the dance, albeit as a lower seed.

Here are three teams to keep an eye on as we head into the final games of the regular season before Selection Sunday. National Championship odds are courtesy of WynnBET Sportsbook.

Michigan (+10000)

I wrote about the disappointing Michigan season here, but the Wolverines are actually inside the projected tourney field, per Bracket Matrix as an 11 seed.

So, how does Michigan stay there? The team is just 15-11 on the year, and has a tough finish to the regular season, but can cement themselves as a Tournament team ahead of Selection Sunday with some impressive wins.

The team is home for Illinois, Michigan State and Iowa before closing at Ohio State. The Wolverines have been fantastic at home this season, recently blowing out Purdue by 20+, so a 2-1 stretch before playing Ohio State can do wonders for the team.

Of course, there is also the elephant in the room that the team will be without Juwan Howard for the rest of the regular season due to his altercation at the end of the Wisconsin game last Sunday.

We'll see how the Selection Committee weighs the Wolverines play without their head coach down the stretch, but the team controls their own destiny to mitigate what has been a failure of a season to date.

Oregon (+10000)

Oregon has struggled this season, at one point sitting 6-6, and have been as volatile as any team in the country notching wins over UCLA and USC in succession, but also dropped a pair of games to Cal and Arizona State recently.

Currently, the Ducks are firmly on the outside of the projected field, per Bracket Matrix, but that is before the team knocked off UCLA on Thursday night, surely helping their case. The team gets USC at home on Saturday night, another must win situation before going to Washington to face both the Huskies and Washington State.

A 3-0 mark to close the regular season will help the Ducks case, who are far from their +4000 preseason National Championship odds preseason at 100-1 now. Even with an undefeated close, Dana Altman's club will likely need to show a bit more in the PAC 12 Tournament to ensure they make the dance.

Virginia Tech (+15000)

Virginia Tech didn't have as high of hopes as the other teams this season as the aforementioned two, but this team was projected inside of the tourney field heading into the year.

Head coach Mark Schmidt has his best roster in Blacksburg with not only seniors Keve Aluma and Justyn Mutts, but also transfer guard Storm Murphy. Despite high regards from the likes of KenPom (33rd as of this writing) the Hokies play hasn't acted like it.

The team started 2-7 in ACC play before improving their mark to 9-8 as they head into the final three games of the regular season. It doesn't help the Hokies, who are outside the field in most projected brackets, are playing in a down ACC this season. The conference has one ranked team at the moment (Duke), but will have a handful of teams in the field like Wake Forest, Miami and North Carolina. Can the Hokies make a push?

The team will likely need to win all three games going into the ACC Tournament against Miami and Clemson on the road and a home game against Louisville. After that, a few wins in the ACC Tournament will give them heavy consideration for a bid.

There's still time for this talented roster to make it happen this season and hit their goal of a Tournament berth.