Want to see 4 of the top 10 teams in the nation play? Good news! They’re all in this region.
After four months of winnowing, the greatest single-elimination contest is sports is set to begin. From 362 D1 basketball programs, 68 have been chosen to spend three weekends playing for the sport’s national title. Each of the four regions will battle to send one representative to the Final Four. We start with the Midwest.
When I was a kid, there was a strategy I saw my siblings employ in which they would take a task that my mother gave them and do it in a performatively mediocre manner. Sometimes the goal was to just get my mom to do it herself, but more often it was to change the victory condition of the task. If one of them was assigned to advance the laundry and get everything folded, for example, doing it badly enough often enough might get my mom to just accept their getting the stuff out of the dryer and into a basket. Needless to say, I was scandalized when I caught on to their game.
Anyway, there has been increasing noise around the tournament expanding beyond the current 68 teams, but resistance among the more earnest college basketball fans has been intense. One way to break that down, I think, would be to have a bracket with inclusions and seeding so incomprehensible that people would just throw their hands up and accept 72 or 80 or 96 teams to avoid another cluster of this magnitude.
Ladies and gentlemen and everyone else not included in those two categories, allow me to introduce the East region.
The once and future (?) king: #1 UConn
They’re the best team in the nation, full stop. Since Donovan Clingan came back from injury, they’ve topped the Torvik rankings and lost only once. He’s a goliath in the middle whose comically dominant block rate anchors the team’s defense. He’s also just 4th on the team in PPG and 5th in MPG; this team is a wagon with or without him. Their offense is relentless from all five positions and just wear opponents down; their defense in 4th in the nation in EFG% and 11th overall. Any team will have its work cut out against the Huskies.
The other #1 seeds: #2 Iowa State and #4 Auburn
Do you like outcome based metrics to be used for seeding? Makes sense, as inclusion and seeding should be a measure of what you’ve accomplished on the year. If so, Iowa State has your attention here. They’re 4th in the country with 6.9 WAB, a win and a half clear of the 5th-placed team. What’s more remarkable is that they were at 0.0 on January 1 and then lost their next game. Since then, they’ve won 16 of 20, capped by ripping off wins over K State, Baylor, and Houston to win the Big 12 tournament that the committee clearly didn’t watch. Their reward for that is the lowest 2 seed.
More confusing still is the treatment of Auburn, who landed #4 in the KenPom and #5 in WAB. They did everything the committee claimed to value in one of their nonsensical explanations for a Big East team they excluded, going away from home to play Baylor and scheduling a true roadie at Appalachian State in a time when most high-majors won’t even take that call. They’ve got a top 10 offense and a top 5 defense. They play fast, fun basketball and won the SEC tournament that the committee clearly didn’t watch. Their reward for that is being placed with three other top 10 teams in the East region.
Best first-round game: #7 Washington State v. #10 Drake
These teams are within touching distance in most metrics, and the fact that they’re playing in the Midwest probably further narrows any edge Washington State might have had. Drake wins with offense, led by do-everything forward Tucker DeVries playing for his dad and trying to erase the memory of having what was literally the worst game of his collegiate career in the first round against Miami (FL) last year. They’re patient without being methodical and can score on all three levels. Their defense is no great shakes, but they seal off the glass better than any team in the nation.
Washington State doesn’t care about most of that and will gladly accept making a kid cry in front of his dad for the second year running as the cost of doing business in March. They’re crazy long, ranking 2nd in the nation in average height to Drake’s 307th; there’s three inches of height deficit for Drake on average per position. They’re not busy in the passing lanes, but they block a lot of shots, force tough shots in general, and do a great job on the defensive glass. They’ve got forward Isaac Jones as the guy you can throw the ball to and ask to go get a bucket, but by and large this is a team that lives and dies on stops.
This is a clash of opposing styles; I’m very intrigued to see who can force their identity onto the game.
Player to watch: Boo Buie, #9 Northwestern
Buie has been carrying a comical load for the Wildcats since he first showed up on campus. Now in his super senior year, he’s playing 36 minutes per game with a usage rate of almost 28% and posting an ORtg of 116.2. He has an assist rate of nearly 30% and rarely turns the ball over. Perhaps most impressively, he came into the year as a 32% three-point shooter but raised his career mark to over 35% by going 85-192 (44.3%) on the year. He put up 40/9/9 in two games in last year’s tournament; he’ll be looking to make another step forward in his curtain call in purple.
Plus I really need him to go ham to knock out Florida Atlantic and justify my irrational rage that they were handed an 8 seed when they should have been in the NIT.
The sneaky vulnerable team: #5 San Diego State
All the 5/12 upset buzz is going to paper tigers James Madison and McNeese State, but keep an eye on this one. SDSU is a defensive menace and UAB would have been watching from home if all the good teams in their conference hadn’t lost in the conference tournament before the Blazers had to play them, but…
San Diego State builds its defense around forcing misses, which is fine because making shots isn’t part of UAB’s plan anyway. What UAB does do is fly to the glass, where SDSU is mediocre. They also draw a ton of fouls, which is a weak spot in San Diego State’s defense; they’re actually below average in defensive FT rate. In addition to that, they aren’t that deep. You don’t have to squint too hard at this one to see SDSU getting into some early foul trouble that disrupts their flow, the neutral crowd getting behind the underdog, and the refs getting caught up and swept away in the moment.
Am I saying I have the guts to pick it? No. Am I saying you should and then give me the credit if it works? Absolutely.
Sweet 16 picks:
#1 UConn, #2 Iowa State, #3 Illinois, #4 Auburn
That’s right straight chalk. UConn is the best team in the country, ISU should have been a 1 seed, Illinois has to get through BYU and I don’t believe in them at all, and Auburn also could have been a 1 seed and will probably just have to beat the 13 and 12 seeds to win two games.
Regional final prediction:
UConn over Illinois
So brave! I picked the 3 instead of the 2 to lose to the 1.