After a topsy-turvy Saturday, today's three games held to form.

Notre Dame and Canisius won their respective conference tournaments. Duke handled St. John's in its regular season finale.

As a result, I'll stick with my projected field from last night. The last three at-large berths go to Ohio State, Navy and Denver. Of course, those spots could also go to Army, Georgetown and Brown. Or Princeton, Drexel and one of those other six teams. It's still a bit of guesswork.

However, I will offer an alternate bracketing from last night, since Maryland coach Dave Cottle, a selection committee member, told me last week there is a requirement to avoid pairing teams from the same league in the first round.

(That must have been developed in the last few years; Rutgers and Georgetown played in 2003 despite their ECAC membership).

If three teams from the west make it, and the ban on league rematches is in effect, it would require the committee to go beyond its limit of two flights in the first round. I brought that scenario up with committee chairman Tim Pavlechko last week.

"We seed 1 to 8, and from then on it's trying to be fiscally responsible with those flights," Pavlechko said. "You look at the teams and the flights that are then selected. That's an important thing. Once the 16-team field is filled, the committee will go into those pairings and look at that. There might be a time where we might have more. [But] our guidelines say we have to be fiscally responsible."

Maybe that time has arrived. And this bracket would certainly reflect it, and would be much more balanced than last night's effort:

(1) Duke vs. ECAC/Loyola

* The Blue Devils start out with a regular-season rematch with a team they drilled 21-8 back in March.

(8) GWLL/Notre Dame vs. PATRIOT/Colgate

* There are enough numbers floating about that suggest Notre Dame is a top-five team. The Irish's strength of schedule is not one of them. They deserve their first-ever home tournament game, but common sense should prevail and keep them from rising too much higher than No. 8.

(5) Johns Hopkins vs. Navy

* The GWLL final didn't go the way the Mids hoped it might, but it was still a very useful weekend for Richie Meade and Co. A trip to Homewood can't be much more frustrating than than drilling the Blue Jays delivered last month.

(4) North Carolina vs. AMERICA EAST/UMBC

* UMBC could go a great many places; so much depends on how heavily the Retrievers' America East-influenced strength of schedule is really weighed.

(3) Syracuse vs. MAAC/Canisius

* Even if only two western teams are in the field, this is an easy safety valve for the committee to claim "fiscal responsibility.

(6) IVY/Cornell vs. CAA/Hofstra

* If the Pride isn't shipped to Ithaca, it might end up at Hopkins or Maryland. Cornell's alternate opponents include Colgate or a western team.

(7) Maryland vs. Ohio State

* This is just one guess, though the Buckeyes have a pretty decent case for inclusion --- victories over North Carolina and Denver (twice).

(2) Virginia vs. Denver

* Navy, Ohio State and UMBC are also logical options to be shipped to Charlottesville.

--- Patrick Stevens