Buzz Williams Dances You Into the Regular Season's Final Weekend

First things first, I present Marquette coach Buzz Williams walking it out, courtesy of The Dagger:

I doubt Williams will win any dance contests, but he's probably on that second tier of coaches when you talk about national coach of the year. Yes, his team is just 20-9, but credit him for taking a heavily revamped roster and contending in college hoops' deepest league. The Golden Eagles play their final regular season game against Notre Dame on Saturday, but their No. 5 seed in the Big East tourney is already locked up.

While some conference tournaments are already under way, this is the final weekend of the regular season for larger conferences. Here's your roadmap to the weekend.

Friday

Cornell vs. Brown, 7 p.m. ET, No TV: Why pay attention to a Friday night Ivy League game? If you're a sucker for March Madness really getting under way, then this is one to watch. A win Friday gives the Big Red the first NCAA Tournament bid for this year's Big Dance.

Saturday

No. 10 West Virginia vs. No. 9 Villanova, noon ET, CBS: Villanova is is 4-4 after starting 20-1. It figured the Wildcats would hit a few bumps once they got into the meat of their schedule. One of those four recent wins came against West Virginia at the beginning of this hellish run. Now Nova gets West Virginia at home. The Mountaineers, meanwhile, have basically played the inverse schedule of the Wildcats. Things have opened up a bit for them down the stretch, and they got their one matchup against Syracuse out of the way in January. Winner of this one gets a leg up on a No. 2 seed, but in the end they could both wind up on that line come Selection Sunday.

Cincinnati vs. No. 19 Georgetown, noon ET, ESPN360: Georgetown is trying to protect a lofty seed, but this is a last-gasp for the Bearcats. (Well, the Big East tournament is the last gasp, but for at-large purposes, this is it.) A Cincinnati win would at least lay the ground work for a run in the Big East tourney that could make them one of the last few at-larges in. They'll still have to root hard for the regular season winners to hold serve in mid-major leagues.

Texas vs. No. 21 Baylor, 4 p.m. ET, ESPN: Texas, mercifully, is finally out of the polls. (Evidence that polls are dumb: It took this long for the Longhorns to get bounced.) I don't think anyone suspects Texas will miss the field of 65 -- Joe Lunardi has them as a No. 7 seed as of this writing. But this is about controlling the tailspin at this point. J'Covan Brown somewhat miraculously returned to the lineup earlier this week and played a strong game with 15 points and five boards against Oklahoma. Texas is a team everyone should watch closely. They're obviously loaded with talent, even after that plague took away two starting point guards, but they haven't been right since early-to-mid January. If they stay around that No. 7 seed area and show any glimmer of figuring things out, try to tell me they won't scare every No. 2 seed to death in the second round. (Major caveat: that they work out whatever funk has descended over their team for the last month-plus.)

No. 16 Tennessee vs. Mississippi State, 6 p.m. ET, ESPN: Mississippi State probably finds itself on the wrong side of the bubble, but a win against Tennessee would mean a great deal to the Bulldogs. Would it put them over the top and get them into the field? If we're going by Lunardi's "first four out" I'd have to think Mississippi State could vault at least UAB and Memphis with that win.

Sunday

No. 15 Wisconsin vs. Illinois, 1 p.m. ET, ESPN: Bubble implications for Illinois, as some of those teams I mentioned before will probably root loudly for Wisconsin here. Illinois is probably in as it stands, but how kindly would the selection committee view them with a season-ending loss to Wisconsin and a first-round out in the Big Ten tourney, leaving them at 18-14. A win here makes Illinois a lock. A loss at least leaves some debate.

*No, I didn't forget North Carolina-Duke at 9 p.m. ET on Saturday. Unless Duke falls, this thing carries zero significance for the tournament. Plus, did you watch the last meeting? It was not pretty.

This post originally appeared on the Sporting Blog. For more, see The Sporting Blog Archives.