The men’s basketball tournament is the NCAA’s biggest showpiece, and they messed it all up.
The tournament is finally here. Xavier isn’t in it, nor should they be, but the glorious bracket has been unveiled, the seeding has been analyzed, and the talking heads have talked. It was a great Selection Sunday, because all Selection Sunday’s are great.
Have you ever had a Christmas that didn’t go according to plan, though? Maybe your gifts didn’t land right. Maybe you didn’t get what you wanted, or the roast burned, or the morning coffee was lukewarm, or the cinnamon rolls didn’t have a can of frosting each, or whatever it may have been. It was Christmas, and Christmas isn’t ever full on bad, but it was disappointing. That was this Selection Sunday.
This tournament is the showpiece of the NCAA. Even the BCS doesn’t bring in the eyes that the men’s basketball tournament does. There is no other event like this in the United States.
And the NCAA made a mess of it.
What the committee got right
There are 68 teams in the tournament. Great job, guys!
Holy crap, and in four regions! Well done!
Leaving out Indiana State. Seriously, play someone.
What the committee got wrong
The Big East got screwed
Let’s start close to home and at the top of the bracket. UConn is the top team in the bracket. That makes sense, they have the top resume after Purdue got knocked off. Good on Dan Hurley and the boys. The problem is that they were rewarded with the toughest bracket. The East has the best two seed (more on them later), the best metric ranking of teams two through four no matter which metric you use, the conference winner from a six bid league, and the 16th team in KenPom lurking on the six line. The committee, in all their wisdom, gave the consensus toughest region to the team they “rewarded” with the top seed.
UConn, though, should have led a long list of Big East teams in the tournament. Prior to the Selection Show, most brackets had St. John’s and Seton Hall in, with Providence hanging on the bubble. Instead, the second best conference in the nation got three teams in the tournament. We’ll get into who should have been left out, but St. John’s should have been in. Seton Hall probably should have been in, and Providence definitely has a case. Kim English was outspoken in saying “the metrics are bulls***” and suggesting that running up the score on bad teams was the way to go. It seems that way, but the committee also left out Oklahoma, who did just that.
FAU and Virginia shouldn’t be in this tournament
Click if you need to make that bigger, but you are looking at the first four out, the Big East snubs, and the two teams mentioned. Joel said, “If it’s about metrics, Johnnies have them. If it’s about good wins, Seton Hall and Providence have them. If it’s about avoiding bad losses, all the BE teams have them.” Is it Q1 wins? FAU has two. Is it avoiding bad losses? FAU has the two worst and three losses outside the top quads. Does the NET matter? Indiana State is the highest team ever left out. Do the metrics matter? St. John’s is top 25. Prefer BPI or SOR? Then get St. John’s, Providence, or Oklahoma in there. The committee was wildly inconsistent this year, and it cost teams that should be in and somehow gave us a team that lost to Bryant, FGCU, Charlotte, UAB, and Temple. Stupid.
Per Bryan, “Florida Atlantic earned their bid last April. They have one good win and one decent win. Nothing else they have done suggests they should have made the tournament. That brings us to Virginia who had 2 Q1 wins. If avoiding bad losses is the goal then Providence also did that and won three times as many games in Q1. I don’t see what you can look at and rank either of these teams ahead of St. John’s, Providence, Seton Hall, or Oklahoma.”
The seeding is all messed up
FAU shouldn’t be in and is an eight. Michigan State was a bubble team and landed on the nine line. An entire article could be written on the absolute slap in the face the Mountain West got. Utah State as an eight is hilarious, as is the idea that Boise State belongs in Dayton or that New Mexico wouldn’t have been in at all if they hadn’t won the MWC tournament.
Iowa State is fourth on Torvik and fifth on KenPom. They somehow got the last two seed while UNC, ninth in both and below ISU in NET and SOR, got a one seed. As a further insult, the committee put the Cyclones with UConn. Auburn is fourth in KenPom, fifth in Torvik, fourth in BPI, fifth in NET, and 10th in SOR. What does that resume get you? A four seed! Again, that is in UConn’s bracket.
McNeese and Colorado are too low. Gonzaga is too high. Dayton is too high. Northwestern should be playing in. BYU shouldn’t get special treatment. It’s a huge mess and is probably the worst seeded tournament in a decade.
How to fix this
Put basketball people on the committee. Right now the committee is athletic directors and commissioners. They are all ostensibly fine people with a broad base of knowledge and also someone from Butler. None of them are basketball people. This field requires someone who knows and cares about this game, not just sports in general. We all have friends who like soccer, and the NFL, and the NBA, and college football. There’s nothing wrong with that at all. That’s great. Those people can grate a little, though, come March when they talk about Duke and Gonzaga and John Calipari and don’t really know anything about Nevada.
That’s who picked your tournament field this year. Get those people (mostly) out and bring in people who know and follow the game like a religion. Ken Pomeroy should be at that table with former coaches, guys who understand metrics, and a couple of the current committee to add balance and make sure the things sorts correctly on the bracketing standards.
Because when you let the committee pick on its own, you get this mess.