that THEY don't have to win their conf tourney to get a 1 seed. If only every regular season major conf. champion could say the same thing. 

Don't get me wrong, I understand a certain level of skepticism regarding teams vying for a 1 seed. But seems that the cards have gotten a much bigger piece of that pie than say UNC, Pitt or UConn have gotten. The standard is obviously built upon how many weeks a team spent at no. 1 on the AP poll. Simply hovering around the top doesn't carry the weight of actually being the nation's best rated team. 

But to further illustrate my point, let me examine a couple of Bilas' statements about what he looks at:

two weeks ago he was discussing Maryland as a bubble team saying that it wasn't the losses that he was looking at, but the wins. "I want to see who a team has beaten to know that they can have a chance of beating those types of teams in the tourney. Anyone can lose games, but can you win the big ones"

today Bilas said - regarding UofL's claims to a 1  seed - "Look at who they lost to earlier in the season: Minnesota, UNLV, Western Kentucky, those losses don't add up to a 1 seed.

double standard if you ask me.