Are you ready for some Madness?
As I type this, it is Sunday night in New York City. The Selection Show ended just two hours ago, and I am still flying from the adrenaline rush. That will be my fuel as I dive in with wall-to-wall coverage of the NCAA Tournament over the next three-and-a-half weeks here at Hoops HQ.
We’ve got our entire roster ready and activated. And now that we have a bracket to discuss… let’s discuss it. I’ve got loads of region-by-region analysis underneath my bracket, so be sure to scroll down and check it all out. It’s March. Let’s dance!
Seth's Bracket
Duke Blue Devils
Siena Saints
Ohio State Buckeyes
TCU Horned Frogs
St. John's Red Storm
Northern Iowa Panthers
Kansas Jayhawks
California Baptist Lancers
Louisville Cardinals
South Florida Bulls
Michigan State Spartans
North Dakota State Bison
UCLA Bruins
UCF Knights
UConn Huskies
Furman Paladins
Duke Blue Devils
Ohio State Buckeyes
St. John's Red Storm
Kansas Jayhawks
Louisville Cardinals
Michigan State Spartans
UCLA Bruins
UConn Huskies
Duke Blue Devils
St. John's Red Storm
Michigan State Spartans
UCLA Bruins
Duke Blue Devils
UCLA Bruins
Florida Gators
Lehigh Mountain Hawks
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Prairie View A&M Panthers
Clemson Tigers
Iowa Hawkeyes
Vanderbilt Commodores
McNeese Cowboys
Nebraska Cornhuskers
Troy Trojans
North Carolina Tar Heels
VCU Rams
Illinois Fighting Illini
Penn Quakers
Saint Mary's Gaels
Texas A&M Aggies
Houston Cougars
Idaho Vandals
Florida Gators
Clemson Tigers
Vanderbilt Commodores
Nebraska Cornhuskers
VCU Rams
Illinois Fighting Illini
Saint Mary's Gaels
Houston Cougars
Florida Gators
Vanderbilt Commodores
Illinois Fighting Illini
Houston Cougars
Florida Gators
Houston Cougars
Duke Blue Devils
Houston Cougars
Duke Blue Devils
Arizona Wildcats
Arizona Wildcats
Michigan Wolverines
Arizona Wildcats
Long Island Sharks
Villanova Wildcats
Utah State Aggies
Wisconsin Badgers
High Point Panthers
Arkansas Razorbacks
Hawaii Rainbow Warriors
BYU Cougars
Texas Longhorns
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NC State Wolfpack
Gonzaga Bulldogs
Kennesaw State Owls
Miami Hurricanes
Missouri Tigers
Purdue Boilermakers
Queens Royals
Arizona Wildcats
Villanova Wildcats
Wisconsin Badgers
Arkansas Razorbacks
Texas Longhorns
Gonzaga Bulldogs
Miami Hurricanes
Purdue Boilermakers
Arizona Wildcats
Wisconsin Badgers
Gonzaga Bulldogs
Purdue Boilermakers
Arizona Wildcats
Purdue Boilermakers
Michigan Wolverines
UMBC Retrievers
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Howard Bison
Georgia Bulldogs
Saint Louis Billikens
Texas Tech Red Raiders
Akron Zips
Alabama Crimson Tide
Hofstra Pride
Tennessee Volunteers
Miami (OH) RedHawks
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SMU Mustangs
Virginia Cavaliers
Wright State Raiders
Kentucky Wildcats
Santa Clara Broncos
Iowa State Cyclones
Tennessee State Tigers
Michigan Wolverines
Saint Louis Billikens
Akron Zips
Hofstra Pride
Tennessee Volunteers
Virginia Cavaliers
Santa Clara Broncos
Iowa State Cyclones
Michigan Wolverines
Akron Zips
Virginia Cavaliers
Iowa State Cyclones
Michigan Wolverines
Iowa State Cyclones
EAST
• If it looks like this is the toughest region, it’s because it is. As we demonstrated on the show, if you add up the totals of the overall seeds of the top four seeds in each region, the East has by far the lowest number. Here’s the thing, though: You only have to play one team at a time. So while Duke’s road is technically the toughest of all the No. 1 seeds, many of the other teams are going to cannibalize each other by the time one of them gets to the Blue Devils.
• A couple of weeks ago, I’m sure I would have picked Duke to win it all, but their injury concerns gave me just enough pause to go with Arizona. Junior point guard Caleb Foster appears to be done for the season (there’s an outside chance he could play at the Final Four), but Duke can win a title without him by giving more minutes to freshman Cayden Boozer. Losing sophomore forward Patrick Ngongba is far more problematic. He is vital to this team (remember, it was after he fouled out that Duke collapsed at North Carolina), but the good news is his injury appears to be less serious than Foster’s. Ngongba did not play in the ACC Tournament, but Duke was projecting optimism that he would be available for the tourney. Tough region or not, Duke is going to be a very tough out.
• It was only a few weeks ago that Ohio State was on the outside looking in. Now the Buckeyes are a No. 8 seed. Kudos to Jake Diebler and his crew for their improvement, especially on the interior (and especially freshman forward Amare Bynum). They almost knocked off Michigan in the Big Ten tourney, so I like Ohio State to ride that momentum into the second round.
• Yes, I was surprised to see St. John’s pop up as a No. 5 seed after winning the Big East Tournament, but remember, those tourney games count the same as regular-season games. Northern Iowa is a dangerous team (the Panthers lost a bunch of midseason games because of injuries), but the notion of a St. John’s-Kansas matchup in the second round is too delectable to contemplate. The big question, as always, will be the health and effectiveness of Darryn Peterson, but I think the Red Storm are too big and physical for the Jayhawks to handle. It’s not often you get two Hall of Fame coaches squaring off in the second round. When it happened last season, John Calipari and Arkansas knocked off Rick Pitino’s Johnnies.
• Michigan State tumbled to the No. 3 line after losing to UCLA at the Big Ten tourney. I don’t think that result was a fluke. UCLA has been playing smarter, tougher, more efficient basketball the past four weeks, not least because Skyy Clark finally got healthy from his torn hamstring. Junior point guard Donovan Dent, who has been playing out of his mind, went down with a lower leg injury in the loss to Purdue and senior forward Tyler Bilodeau likewise injured his leg in the win over Michigan State. The word out of Chicago is that both will be ready to go for the NCAA tourney. If that’s the case, I think the Bruins will get to the Elite Eight and bow out against Duke.
SOUTH
• Some people might be ready to tiptoe off the Florida bandwagon after the Gators got throttled by Vanderbilt in the SEC Tournament, but I think that loss is the best thing that could have happened to them. They were riding high, so it’s useful to get knocked back and establish a reset. I’m sure Todd Golden secretly was happy for the chance to get all over his guys in the leadup practices for the NCAA Tournament. And it will be a compelling subplot (or even foreplot) if the Gators and Commodores meet up in the Sweet Sixteen, which I expect they will.
• As I said during the Selection Show, I am unabashedly rooting for Nebraska to at least win its first-round game over Troy. This program famously never has won an NCAA Tournament game, and after starting off 20-0, the Huskers stumbled down the stretch, losing six of their past 12. Troy will not be an easy out, either. This is the second consecutive tourney appearance for Scott Cross’ Trojans, and they won the Sun Belt Conference regular-season and tourney titles this season. I’m picking Nebraska to at least win that game because the alternative is too awful to contemplate.
• Vanderbilt, by the way, won’t have an easy time getting past McNeese State in the first round. The Cowboys return two starters and a few others from the team that beat Clemson in the first round last season with Will Wade as coach.
• I was surprised to learn that VCU would not have gotten an at-large bid if it hadn’t won the Atlantic-10 Tournament. Regardless, the Rams were wire-to-wire dominant in their win over a surging Dayton squad. So I like them to beat a North Carolina team that just isn’t the same with freshman forward Caleb Wilson lost to a hand injury. I think Illinois can get to the Sweet Sixteen, but the Illini have not shown the defensive toughness you need to be truly successful in March. That’s going to be a problem if they face Houston.
• As for the Cougars, I’ve been talking all season about the possibility that they could play in the South Regional in Houston. You saw how closely they played Arizona on Saturday night in the Big 12 title game. Would anyone really want to bet against Kelvin Sampson and his crew playing in their city for a chance to go to the Final Four?
WEST
• First of all, that 8-9 game is a doozy. Utah State has been the class of the Mountain West all season, and Jerrod Calhoun has his Aggies primed for their fourth consecutive NCAA Tournament appearance. (The first two were with his two predecessors, Ryan Odom and Danny Sprinkle.) And Villanova is now playing without freshman forward Matt Hodge, a starter who recently was lost to a torn ACL in his right knee. Still, I’ll take the Wildcats in this one. They’ve been a tough defensive team all season (with one the country’s best offensive rebounders in senior forward Duke Brennan) and have a slew of dynamic guards. Kevin Willard showed in taking Maryland to a Sweet Sixteen last season that he knows how to get his teams ready for March. Villanova has been a pleasant surprise this season, and I think Willard’s ’Cats have one more win in them.
• If Kansas-St. John’s isn’t the sexiest second-round matchup on the board, Arkansas-Wisconsin is. You are a passionate college basketball fan, so you are well-aware that the Badgers no longer play stodgy, walk-it-up, work-it-around basketball. They can score with the best of them, and they’re going to have to do so in order to keep up with Darius Acuff Jr. and the SEC tourney champs. Wisconsin notched huge road wins at Michigan, Illinois and Purdue, and they competed well at the Big Ten Tournament (beating Illinois and almost beating Michigan) without leading rebounder Nolan Winter. He should be back for the NCAA Tournament, so I decided to go with the Badgers. They’re capable of beating anyone, including Arizona.
• It’s hard to know what to make of Purdue. The Boilermakers obviously ramped up their competitiveness by winning the Big Ten Tournament, but this is the same team (or at least the same group of players) that lost five times at home and dropped four of their last six regular-season games. Purdue needs to be supremely locked in to be a championship-level defensive team. They were that team in Chicago, but will they ride that momentum or revert to the mean? I’ve got them advancing to the Elite Eight, but that’s more because of the somewhat weak competition relative to the other regions.
• There has been a clear top tier all season of Arizona, Duke and Michigan. You can’t go wrong picking any of them to win a title, but I went with the Wildcats because they are the healthiest of the three. I mentioned the Duke injuries, and Michigan lost backup point guard L.J. Cason to a season-ending ACL tear. The Wildcats proved their mettle by winning the regular-season and tournament titles in the toughest league in the country. I’m not the least bit bothered by them starting three freshmen, with a fourth coming off the bench. Plus, they are way more proficient at three-point shooting now than they were the first half of the season. (Thank you, Anthony Dell’Orso.) I also think Arizona has an easier path to Indianapolis relative to the other No. 1 seeds.
MIDWEST
• This is the region where I broke out my slingshot. First of all, I am taking Akron to knock off Texas Tech in the first round. The 5-12 matchup has been ripe for upsets over the years, and Texas Tech clearly is feeling the effects of losing junior forward JT Toppin for the season. Sophomore point guard Christian Anderson also suffered a minor injury on the slippery court in Kansas City. The school says he’s good to go, but the Red Raiders are going up against an Akron squad that is making its fourth NCAA appearance in five seasons under John Groce. The Zips finished second to Miami (Ohio) in the MAC standings, and I think they’re in a great position to pull the upset.
• I’ve been a Hofstra fan all season, largely because of the dynamic guard tandem of senior Cruz Davis and freshman Preston Edmead. The Pride are well-suited to play the up-and-down, three-heavy style that Alabama will bring to this game. The Tide looked vulnerable down the stretch, which included a loss to Ole Miss in the SEC Tournament. It would be a shock if the Pride won this game, but the 4-13 matchup has produced memorable upsets over the years.
• Also, here’s a tip on filling out a bracket: If you want to gamble on an upset, look for it to happen to a team that isn’t going to go far if you’re wrong. I don’t think Alabama can get past Michigan in the Sweet Sixteen (Bama is No. 67 on KenPom in adjusted defensive efficiency), so if you pick against the Tide on the first weekend and it doesn’t happen, it probably won’t cost you too badly.
• Virginia quietly has had a terrific season. The Cavs have lost just five games, and two were to Duke, including a tight 74-70 decision in the ACC Tournament final Saturday night. Wright State is a tricky No. 14 seed, but I do think Virginia has the strength in the frontcourt to match up well with Tennessee in a potential second-round game.
• I’m taking Herb Sendek’s Santa Clara Broncos to knock off Kentucky in the first round. The Broncos have terrific positional size across the board, and the Wildcats have been way too erratic this season, which is why they lost five of their final seven regular-season games.
• Even as I was making my Final Four predictions on the Selection Show, I was starting to regret going with Michigan over Iowa State in the Midwest Regional final. The Cyclones’ loss to Arizona in a Big 12 tourney semifinal was one of the best games of the season. Their offense can be spotty, but the Cyclones always will play tough defense. I guess I’ll still lean Michigan because of their size in the frontcourt, but Yaxel Lendeborg did not play well at the Big Ten Tournament. It’s impressive that the Wolverines still found a way to reach the final, but that is not Plan A. If Michigan is going to fulfill its potential, Lendeborg is going to have to perform not only like the Wolverines’ best player but one of the top three or four best players in the country. It’s winning time.
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