It was only a week ago the Orange seemed destined to accept their fate as an NIT team. Hell, the Orange even found themselves (however briefly) in a position of possibly being out of the Big East Tournament. Maybe Scoop and his 5.2 point per game were holding us back because since his suspension, the Orange have rattled off two wins in a row, nuzzled their way back onto the bubble and in the eyes of those who claim to know such things, they've even worked their way back into the NCAA tournament...barely.
That's Joe Lunardi putting the Orange in the tournament as an 11 seed against 6-seed Gonzaga. Cuse is also one of Lunardi's "Last Four In" so the margin for error that separates first-round loss to the Zags and breaking the NIT home attendance record against St. Peter's is razor thin.
Meanwhile, The Bracket Project, which takes all the "bracketologists" out there and combines their predictions, had the Orange as one of the "Last Four Out" as-of their last update.
To the point, if you didn't feel like every game is extremely important from here on our already, you best start doing so.