Another milestone on the road to the NCAA Tournament came Saturday when the tournament selection committee announced the current top 16 teams. With about a month until Selection Sunday, this is the eighth year in a row that the committee has given us insight into its thought process.
If the tournament started tomorrow, the top 16 seeds would be: The assigned region is displayed in parentheses.
1. purdue boiler maker (Midwest)
2. university university Husky dog (east)
3. Houston Cougars (South)
Four. arizona wildcats (West)
Five. north carolina tar heels (east)
6. volunteer tennessee (Midwest)
7. market golden eagles (South)
8. kansas jayhawks (West)
9. alabama crimson tide (South)
Ten. baylor bears (Midwest)
11. iowa cyclone (east)
12. duke blue devils (West)
13. Auburn Tigers (West)
14. San Diego State Aztecs (Midwest)
15. Illinois fighting Illinois (South)
16. wisconsin badger (east)
The fields enclosed in parentheses look like this:
I have three thoughts on what I’m looking at here.
1. Purdue vs. University Con
Connecticut State had historically been a dominant force until winning last year’s national championship. The Huskies have been the No. 1 team in both majors’ Top 25 polls for the past five weeks, and most university officials say they’re the best team to beat as we rapidly head into March.
Purdue also made history last March. Of course, the Boilermakers became the second No. 1 seed to lose in the first round to a No. 16 seed, once again building on the narrative of Matt Painter’s teams not being able to get it done when it matters most.
Even if these things are true, there’s a reason why Purdue appears to be ahead of UW in the committee’s eyes, with a month left until Selection Sunday.
Both teams have just two losses, both in the first quadrant, but Purdue has more wins than Connecticut in the first quadrant (9-8) and second quadrant (6-5) . The Boilermakers currently sit in second place in the NET rankings, two spots ahead of the Huskies.
Of course, this is a very fluid situation. UW’s restart could take a big step forward with a win against No. 4 Marquette on Saturday in what might be the most anticipated game of the regular season so far.
2. Another No.1
Heading into regular season home, one of the major storylines of the season was that two teams, Connecticut and Purdue, appeared to have separated themselves from the rest of the field, at least temporarily.
That’s the perception of the human world, but the world of predictive metrics still favors the Houston Cougars, who are No. 1 in both the NET rankings and Ken Pomeroy’s rankings. With this fact in mind, it was no surprise to see Kelvin Sampson’s club earn the committee’s third No. 1 seed.
The real interest Saturday became which team would take the final spot on the top line.
Teams like Marquette, Tennessee and North Carolina could all sue, but the final No. 1 seed is Tommy Lloyd’s Arizona Wildcats. It makes just as much sense as any other option.
Arizona State has losses in the second and third quadrants, but it also has more wins in the first quadrant (seven) than any team in the country outside of Collegiate Con, Purdue and Houston. The problem for the Wildcats going forward is that with the Pac-12 so low, there’s little room for error if they want to stay in this position after four weeks.
3. Big 12 is the best
The Big 12 is widely considered to be the most complete conference in college basketball this season, so it’s no big surprise that the league had more teams in the top 16 than any other team on Saturday. There was no.
Houston, a freshman, is the only Big 12 player on the first line, while Kansas State, Iowa State and Baylor are all on the second or third line. The main challenge for these teams over the next four months will be finding a way to avoid racking up losses in a league that could feature 68 double-digit teams.
The committee’s original top 16 included a total of seven conferences.
Big 12 — 4
SEC — 3
Big 10 — 3
ACC — 2
Big East — 2
Pac-12 — 1
mountain west — 1
The full roster for the 2020 NCAA Tournament will be announced on Selection Sunday, March 17th at 6:00 PM ET.
