So, every year, this feels like a necessary article. If I am going to create my bracketology and do all this research on the teams, it seems to only make sense to have at least one post about how the selection committee did.

So, lets first talk about a couple strengths. At the end of the day, the committee always does a really great job of selecting and seeding the field. We could make some arguments about some teams here and there, but at the end of the day, the teams that most deserve to be in the dance are playing.

You also can give them a lot of credit for seeding the top part of the tournament. 12 of the 16 protected seeds made it to the Sweet 16, and two of the missing 4 seeds were replaced by 5 seeds. All-in-all, they got the top part of the bracket right.

They also deserve a little bit of grace – I have been doing my bracketology for a long time, and this was one of the hardest fields to create. There is always one or two teams that steal bids in the smaller conferences, but I don’t remember a time when there was clearly 5 bids that teams who knew their season was over without a tournament victory managed to earn their ticket to the dance. By the way, I am not opposed to teams earning their ticket. At the end of the day, one of the interesting things about the NCAA Championship is almost every team has a chance to play in it simply by winning their conference championship.

But it certainly makes the lives of the Selection Committee harder. At the end of the day, most people who watch the game can agree that the teams in the polls should be in the dance – that is 25 teams. Last year, 10 of the automatic bids belonged to the polls. So after including the rest, the committee still had spots for 21 other teams. This year, it was 5. So, the committee only had spots for 16 other teams. This year, teams that would normally be safely in the tournament were playing in the First Four in Dayton. It is one thing to debate whether or not a team should have been a 11 seed in the play-ins or a 9/10 seed. The committee has some margin of error to be wrong. This year – all those 11 seeds are eliminated from the tournament.

The committee is also relatively predictable. Whether I agree with the rankings or not, I was able to predict 34 of the 36 at large teams. When a Lunatic can come up with that list, they are at least relatively consistent. Lets be clear – I would not have picked the 36 teams they did, and I would not have picked the 36 teams that I did in my bracketology – my beliefs and rules of giving at large teams would be different. But because of the process the committee uses, they tend to be very predictable. You might not like the rules of the game – but you at least know the rules.

That doesn’t mean that the Lunatic doesn’t have complaints. I might dig into some of these more next week while I have few games to rant about. But here are my main complaints.

The committee uses the non-conference schedule to keep a team out, but this then diminishes their conference schedule. Clemson went 11-9 in conference and ended up being a 6 seed. Pitt went 12-8 in conference and was left out of the tournament. Sure – the committee doesn’t have the hindsight here – but the rest of the NCAA field so far is 1-8 against the ACC – so 12-8 is pretty good. Add the fact that Clemson swept the Panthers, and that means they went 12-6 against the rest of the conference. Pitt was eliminated because their non-conference schedule was awful. But some of the final teams in didn’t have the greatest non-conference schedules either. Leaving the 4th place team from the ACC out feels like a significant miss.

I also feel like the committee made mistakes on the Mountain West. To be fair, none of us knew what to do with the Mountain West. But I can tell you for sure, there is no reason that the Mountain West should be getting 5 at-large teams when the Big East is getting 2 at-large teams. Those 2 Big East teams are 4-0. The 5 Mt West teams were 4-4 (and one of those wins was a First Four game). When we are taking a team that went 10-8 in the Mountain West over a team that went 13-7 in the Big East, we probably have made a mistake.

The committee also couldn’t figure out how to seed correctly within the Mountain West. San Diego State went 11-7 in conference and was a 5 seed. Utah State won the conference at 14-4, was ranked better than the Aztecs in the polls, and was a 8 seed. I don’t even know how that happens. I could understand if one was a 5 seed and one was a 6 seed. But Utah State finished 3 games ahead of the Aztecs in the standings – how do they fall 3 seed lines below them.

The committee is too tied to the NET rankings. This is the reason why so many Mountain West teams got in – all 6 of the Mountain West teams were in between 20 and 38 in the NET. I will probably rant more about this at some point. But here is the clearest point about the NET – which also ties to the final complaint.

We can not have major conference teams finishing in the top 4 of their conference missing the tournament when we are letting teams in with losing records from their conference.

Lets take Mississippi State – the Bulldogs went 8-10 in the SEC. The Bulldogs finished 9th in the SEC, and while they had 2 big victories over Tennessee, a victory over Auburn, and non-conference wins against Washington State and Northwestern, they also had plenty of losses – including one at Georgia Tech and one at home vs. Southern University.

Now, lets take Seton Hall – who went 13-7 in the Big East. Their big victories included UConn and Marquette. They also had 2 victories against St. John’s and victories against Providence, Villanova, Butler and Xavier. They lost their main non-conference games to Iowa, USC and Rutgers, but that Rutgers loss was the worst NET team they lost to. So – let compare.

Record – Seton Hall (20-12), Mississippi State (21-13)

Conf Record – SH (13-7), Miss St (8-10)

Quad 1 Record – SH (5-8), Miss St (4-9)

Quad 2 Record – SH (4-3), Miss St (4-3)

Quad 3 Record – SH (2-1), Miss St (7-0)

Quad 4 Record – SH (9-0), Miss St (6-1)

NC SOS – SH (227), Miss St (234)

SOS – SH (33), Miss St (28)

So – Seton Hall had a much better conference record in their conference, had comparible records across the different quads, didn’t have the horrible loss to a Quad 4 team, and yet they were left out of the tournament while the Bulldogs were an 8 seed (comfortably in). It is crazy that the 9th place team in the SEC is comfortably in the tournament when the 4 place team in the Big East (behind 3 teams that were seeded no worse than 3rd) is left out. It doesn’t help the Committee’s argument when the Bulldogs then lost by double digits to Michigan State (another .500 team).

But there was one statistic I left out that explains this. Mississippi State’s NET ranking was 31st. Seton Hall’s NET ranking was 67th. I am not sure how this happens, but it did.

There is a point where we need to move away from the statistics and value the conference records. They are not always perfect ways to rank the team, but when teams like Pitt and Seton Hall finish 4th in the competitive ACC and Big East, you have to feel for them when it is because the efficiency statistics say an 8-10 team in the SEC is better than them.

Look – at the end of the day, Seton Hall or Pitt are probably not going to win the National Championship. And Pitt ruined any argument for me when they declined the NIT invitation – if you don’t want to compete any chance you get, it is probably best that you are watching the games at home. But did they deserve a chance over some of the teams that got in? Yes – they probably did.

At the end of the day, all these teams on the bubble had blemishes that meant it was up to the committee to decide their fate. Unlike teams like NC State and Oregon who took their fate into their own hands and earned their tickets to the dance, these bubble teams needed the committee to select them. It is a terribly difficult job that gets heavily scrutinized – so they deserve a ton of credit for always putting together a fantastic tournament. But I still feel like they could do better. It probably doesn’t change the the final weekend – but it certainly matters to those players. Of course, what do I know – I am crazy.

Looks like the North Carolina / Alabama game is really good (and I suspect the Iowa State / Illinois game will also be good). So, I will leave the committee belong and go back to enjoying the games!!!!

At the end of the day, the players on the court win or lose the game. But in this game, Coach Brad Brownell made a decision that changed the entire momentum of the game.

Arizona spent the entire second half cutting the lead to tie the game, simply for Clemson to hit a basket or two to regain the lead. But Brownell made a big decision with 1:06 seconds. Oumar Ballo had just cut the lead to 3 points, and Clemson had taken 21 seconds off the shot clock when they got the ball in the post. As the Clemson player started trying to back down his Arizona defender in the lane, Brownell called time out. As the whistles blew, the shot missed – but of course, it didn’t matter since time out was called.

So, instead of getting this well-contested miss, Clemson inbounded the ball and Chase Hunter found PJ Hall for a dunk to extend the lead to 5. But while the assist in the scorebook goes to Hunter, I feel like the assist here should go to the great play that Brownell drew up during the time-out.

Arizona’s Jaden Bradley made it a two point game with a nice three-pointer from the wing. So, Clemson ran the clock down again and Chase Hunter drove to the basket, made an acrobatic move towards the hoop and scooped the ball in while being fouled. His free throw made it a 5 point game with 25 seconds to play.

Arizona’s Caleb Love drove the lane and hit an impressive jumper in the lane to cut the lead to 3 with 16 seconds. And then the Wildcats forgot they were playing in the NCAA Tournament.

Clemson in-bounded the ball to a wide open Joseph Girard III, who was probably baffled by the fact that the Wildcats were letting him just hold the ball unguarded. By the time the Wildcats realized that they probably needed to foul Girard, he threw the ball all the way up-court to a streaking Dillon Hunter – who made a layup while getting fouled. He missed the free-throw, but at this point, the damage was done.

Jaden Bradley would miss a three-pointer, Chase Hunter would get the defensive rebound, and the Clemson Tigers won 77-72 to advance to the Elite 8. Of course, it makes sense, all the teams in the Sweet 16 had either won a regular season championship, a conference tournament championship or were ranked in the final top 25 poll except for Clemson. So, of course, the first team to advance to the Elite 8 is – Clemson.

Meanwhile, we should also congratulate the UConn Huskies – who completely destroyed San Diego State in the second half. I am not going to write a lot about it since I was watching the closer game in Los Angeles. But the three starting guards for the Huskies, Cam Spencer, Tristen Newton and Stephon Castle combined for 51 points as they almost outscored the Aztecs by themselves. So, the UConn Huskies become the first defending champion to make the Elite 8 since Florida in 2007 by beating the Aztecs 82-52.

Congratulations to the Tigers and Huskies!!!!

I guess the defending national champions need to be on upset alert as well.

With the Huskies being so used to destroying everyone, I imagine that none of us (other than Aztecs fans) expected San Diego State to be keeping it close.

If it wasn’t for Cam Spencer scoring the last 5 points of the half by hitting two free throws and a three-pointer, it would be a 4 point game. So, the Huskies are up 40-31 at halftime, but at times have looked human. If San Diego State can keep the Huskies off the offensive boards in the second half, they might be able to put a scare into the Huskies.

Well – as they go to halftime, I get to go back to Arizona and Clemson – as the Wildcats look like they are mounting a charge. Here’s hoping all 4 games are close tonight!!

The Pac 12 regular season champion is officially on upset alert. Although the Wildcats just got a couple of crazy dunks by Oumar Ballo.

But despite the highlight reel dunks, it is the ACC’s Clemson who are up 39-31 at halftime. Ian Schieffelin has 9 points and Chase Hunter has 8 as it has been the Tigers getting better shots and playing solid defense.

Beware the ACC. They have invaded Los Angeles and Dallas over the next two days – and based on the first 20 minutes of the Sweet 16, it looks like they have intentions to stick around for a while.

I normally try to make the blog a political free zone. I am somewhat of a centrist, and so to be honest, neither political party seems to be representing me well. But in this case, I couldn’t resist.

I have most of my news feeds on my phone about March Madness – I can’t possibly follow every thing, but I am trying as hard as I can. So I was a little surprised to see something about a Michigan GOP legislator – surprised enough to look at it.

And I almost died laughing at the absurdity. Michigan state representative, Rep. Matt Maddock – posted a picture on X of an Allegiant Air flight landing at Detroit Metro Airport with three buses having a police escort. So, the far-right Republican decided to continue the conspiracy theory about illegal immigrants being shipped into major cities. Here was his quote:

“Happening right now. Three busses just loaded up with illegal invaders at Detroit Metro. Anyone have any idea where they’re headed with their police escort?”

Of course, everyone was quick to help out the Michigan representative. Here is the quote from the CNN article.

“The only Allegiant Air flight to the airport on Wednesday was a charter flight that carried the team from Gonzaga University, which plays Purdue University on Friday.“

The comments on his post were a bunch of Gonzaga fans stating that it was the Gonzaga Basketball team and the police escort was taking the team to the Sweet 16.

At least in this case, the only people who should be scared of those who were on that plane are Purdue fans. Oh wait – that is me – maybe they should send a few of the starters home – definitely at least check their papers.

Joking aside, I don’t want to see anyone win a game because of politics. I hope that everyone – fans and definitely players safely get to their Sweet 16 arenas.

Arizona and Clemson are ready to tip-off!!! The games are going to start – I had a few more blog posts that I wanted to add, but we will have to see. There is basketball to watch!!!

Good luck to your second chance picks!

Good luck to your original picks!

Enjoy the games!!!!!

I was thinking about the tournament as I try to do my annual post about how the selection committee did. And I was a little sad about the lack of Cinderella stories left (although while they are not a small school, I don’t know how anyone couldn’t get excited about the run NC State has made – 7 wins in 11 days knowing that losing any of those games ends their season – just an incredible magical run).

But the more I thought about it, I realized how incredibly lucky we are, and how great this Sweet 16 is – lets review this power-house list.

– Big East regular season and tournament champions Connecticut – the #1 team in the final polls

– Big 12 regular season champions Houston – the #2 team in the final polls

– Big 12 tournament champions Iowa State – the #4 team in the final polls

– Big 10 regular season champions Purdue – the #3 team in the final polls

– Big 10 tournament champions Illinois – the #10 team in the final polls

– ACC regular season champions North Carolina – the #5 team in the final polls

– ACC tournament champions NC State – who might be the most exciting story of the tournament so far

– SEC regular season champions Tennessee – the #6 team in the polls

– Pac 12 regular season champions Arizona – the #9 team in the polls

– #8 team in the polls Marquette – who finished tied for second in the Big East and has their star guard back from injuries earlier in the season

– #11 team in the polls Creighton – who finished tied for second in the Big East with Marquette

– #13 team in the polls Duke – who finished second in the ACC

– #18 team in the polls Gonzaga – who just made it to their 9th straight Sweet 16

– #19 team in the polls Alabama – who finished tied for 2nd in the ACC

– #24 team in the polls San Diego State – the Mountain West team who made it all the way to the championship game last season before losing to UConn

– Clemson – who managed to knock off #14 Baylor to make the ACC 8-1 in this tournament.

So, we have all 6 power conference regular season champions, 3 of the 5 power conference tournament champions (excluding UConn since they are in the first category), 2 of the most dominant mid-major teams in recent history. 14 of the 16 teams entered the tournament ranked (including 11 of the top 13 ranked teams). Outside of Clemson and San Diego State, any team that didn’t finish as a tournament or regular season champion finished no worse than tied for 2nd in the regular season.

If you sum it up, you basically have taken the top two teams from almost every power conference, and added the two most successful recent mid-major teams, and say fight it out for the national championship. Except instead of someone just picking those 16 teams, these teams after proving they were the best all through the regular season won 2 more games to earn their spots to play over the next 4 days.

We might be missing Cinderella – but in a way, this might be even better. It should be an amazing Sweet 16 and Elite 8 to watch the best teams in college basketball try to continue their journey to win a national championship.

What could be better than this – the fact that the women’s tournament will also be going on where 13 of the top 16 seeds also made it to the Sweet 16. So much amazing basketball will be going on – my only regret is that I can’t watch every game live since some of them will be played at the same time.

So excited for the games to begin!!! Enjoy what should be a fantastic weekend of college basketball!!!

In case you forgot, there was actually basketball played today. Although for fans from Virginia, it ended badly, as the VCU Rams surprising run in the NIT came to an end in Utah tonight.

But congratulations go out to Utah and Seton Hall, who dominated tonight to make it to the semi-finals, as well as Georgia and Indiana State, who won nail-biter games yesterday to advance.

A couple additional NIT thoughts.

• This year, the NIT has moved the semi-finals and finals to Indianapolis and Hinkle Fieldhouse. How awesome would it be if Indiana State figured out how to revive some movie-like magic and create their own version of Hoosiers next week.
• Oklahoma, Seton Hall, Indiana State, and Pitt were the first four teams left out by the Selection Committee. And to be fair, each of them probably had arguments that they should have been in. But a ton of credit goes to Seton Hall and Indiana State, because after that heart-breaking decision for them, they welcomed the NIT invitation, and have now won 3 games to make it to the final post-season week of 2024 to play for the NIT title. And Oklahoma and Pitt were so upset that they declined the invitation and had to sit at home and watch other teams play basketball. It is amazingly clear who made the better choice.
• Part of the large amount of teams declining bids was due to the NCAA’s horrible decision of opening up the transfer portal – some teams reportedly mentioned that with players who had told them their intention to enter the transfer portal, they would end up going to play the NIT with only 6-8 scholarship players. If they couldn’t field a competitive teams because of the number of players leaving, they chose not to take the invitation. This is a ridiculous decision by the NCAA. The season is not over!!!! There are still games to be played!!!! The fact that teams are not playing in the post-season because their players have already left is a ridiculous fact that has to be fixed.
• By the way, to that last statement, I read an article that one of the Pepperdine players who entered the transfer portal has already signed with Gonzaga. This is simply another reason this should be stopped. I give credit to the Gonzaga coaching staff for thinking about their long-term future along with their upcoming game, but they shouldn’t have to make this decision. Allow the post-season tournaments to finish before you open the transfer window, and these types of problems go away.
• The same should apply to coaches. Dusty May is leaving Florida Atlantic to coach at Michigan and Danny Sprinkle is leaving Utah State to coach at Washington. Within days of being eliminated from the tournament, these two coaches are leaving for larger schools. It is a horrible look for the sport – making it look like those schools might have lost because their coach was more focused on getting their next job instead of their next game. And it also is horrible – because any of the coaches / assistant coaches on the 16 teams still playing are not able to get these new opportunities because their teams are still playing.

I have struggled with this. I had my original picks that I gave on the Podcast (definitely check it out) – but then realized they were very similar to my current picks. I then had wild crazy picks – going under the strategy that with the chalk winning the first 2 rounds, the upsets would eventually have to come. And then after looking of the carnage of upsets, I changed all of it.

I had three reasons for this:

1. Before the tournament as I was doing my bracketology, all I could think to myself is that it is amazing that Connecticut, Houston and Purdue have done so well in the season that they will have 1 seeds no matter what they do in their conference tournaments. Then, when I made my current picks, I tried to find places to not have all 4 top seeds make it to the Final Four, which felt awkward (and led to a horrible pick of Auburn over UConn).
2. Every year, I write an article about how it is impressive that the conference champions manage to survive to the finals (although to be fair, UConn ruined that theory last year – I am already doubting this new strategy).
3. I am a crazy person that overthinks everything. Having this much time to over-analyze my picks causes me to make likely poor choices.

Anyways, here is the strategy that I took. I would pick regular season champions over conference tournament champions. I would pick either over a team who is simply an at-large team. If two teams are at the same level, I will need to make choices.

Oh – one last rule. Once my final four happens, I can not pick a team that my main picks have winning the tournament (Purdue and Connecticut). The whole point is to give me a second chance if something goes wrong (which hopefully will not happen).

So – here is each game based on my new logic.

East – UConn (Big East champ) beats San Diego State. Illinois (Big 10 tourney champ) beats Iowa State (Big 12 tourney champ) – I have felt that the Big 10 has had a slightly better tournament so far, and so the Big 10 champ moves on. UConn will claim the East.

West – UNC (ACC champ) beats Alabama. Arizona (Pac 12 champ) beats Clemson. UNC beats Arizona (since I have felt that the ACC has had a better tournament so far – although the Pac 12 has also out-performed expectations) to claim the West.

South – Houston (Big 12 champ) beats Duke. NC State (ACC tourney champ) beats Marquette – need to have at least one crazy upset). Houston beats NC State since regular season champs beat tourney champs in this strategy to claim the South.

Midwest – Purdue (Big 10 champ) beats Gonzaga. Tennessee (SEC champ) beats Creighton. Purdue beats Tennessee (since I can’t pick against my Boilers yet) to claim the Midwest.

I thought the top teams were clearly better – at this point when they only need to win 2 more games, I should take them.

Now, this is where the strategy goes crazy upsets. I picked Purdue in my insane picks and UConn in my sane picks – so obviously both of them can not advance to the championship against other regular season champions. So, North Carolina will play Houston for the championship.

On one hand, Houston was the higher ranked team going in and came from the conference perceived to be the best going into the tournament. UNC however is clearly from the conference that has performed the best during the tournament. So – the tie-breaker goes to the fact that Elizabeth’s dad went to UNC. My picks this year have been about going with my heart of what I would like to see. And if my Boilers don’t win (the team I desire upon all desire to win) and UConn doesn’t win (the team that my head says should win), picking a team that my family has ties to makes sense.

So – there we go. The Lunatic’s second chance picks will be the 4 favorites making it to the Final 4, and then have chaos happen in Arizona.

That should be relatively easy for all of you to stomp. Good luck to everyone with your second chance picks!!!!

So, Kevin Flippen invited me back this week to his podcast to preview the upcoming Sweet 16. Kevin and I each gave our thoughts in approximately 16 minutes for the Sweet 16 (although I probably caused us to go long).

If you are looking for some extra thoughts on how to fill out your Second Chance Pool – or simply want to hear some fun ramblings from the Lunatic and then some good advice from Kevin, check out the podcast on YouTube!!!!

https://youtu.be/c6ephgo3Se4