Running 2022-23 NCAA Basketball Thread

Consistent winner. Good for them for beating University-6 and winning the crown.
The seed is a big deal if for no other reason than it means you avoid South Carolina until the Final Four.

 

I think this is one of those years where it seems college basketball is down as a whole -- or the parity is so great -- that the bubble is huge.

Like no offense to Marquette, but people believe that is the 6th-best team in the country and a 2-seed/3 seed?

Maryland, a team that can't win a game on the road to save its life, is an 8 seed?

 

Look at the math and it isn’t hard to see the case for WVU. A half-dozen Quad 1 wins and nothing remotely resembling a bad loss.

 

What to do with Tennessee, a team that has lost its point guard and nine games on the year but stands No. 3 in the NET at last check?

I look around the country and often say, "That team's gonna be a one-and-done." There can't be that many one-and-dones. Somebody does have to win these games. But I don't find myself terribly impressed with a lot of teams this year.

 

They have a case. Plenty of good wins. I misread my Excel earlier. Turns out that if it makes the field at large, WVU will be the third Big 12 team in the past four tournaments to get in with a 7-11 regular-season league record, joining Oklahoma in 2019 and Iowa State last year.
Ultimately, the committee chair will have data to back up any choice the panel makes when he goes on CBS and on the teleconference shortly thereafter.

 

How about 13 losses, 8th place in a 10-team conference and only three road wins?

The obligatory interview with the committee chair is worthless. Softball questions, non-answer answers, the same old BS about how a 27-5 mid-major that wasn't picked just has to find more Q1 games, when he knows full well no Q1 school will schedule said mid-major.

I'd like to see an hour post-selection interview with real reporters, not the CBS softies who certainly have a conflict of interest since their network pays billions for the rights.

 

The second fact has no bearing on selection, which somehow seems to surprise folks every year. The first and third are comparable to teams like Auburn and Illinois that are considered safely inside the field.

 

One of those road wins was by 25 at Pitt, which was ranked last week and was competing for a P5 conference championship last weekend. Worst loss is by one to Oklahoma, which won’t be a tournament team but has six Quad 1 wins and decimated Alabama by 24. West Virginia is 17th on KenPom’s ratings right now, and they’ve certainly been tested in the best conference in America, easily.

I can’t stand West Virginia. I’m a Pittsburgh kid with family members and friends all over who have gone to Pitt. West Virginia belongs in the tournament, no question.

 

Wisconsin is the team that's pissing me off this year. Badgers are the fucking 12 seed in the B1G tournament and are still considered on the bubble, even after going 5-8 in their last 13 with their Q1 wins in that span coming at Penn State (18-12) and Ohio State (13-18). Give me a fucking break. No one outside of Madison wants to see that team in the tournament.

Speaking of upsets, Northern Arizona knocked out the 1 seed in the Big Sky (Eastern Washington) on a 28-foot 3-pointer at the buzzer. NAU has been on the wrong end of so many one-point results this season. The Lumberjacks were due to have one go their way.

 

It's all to condition us into thinking the Big 10 and SEC are simply superior in ALL sports.

 

Cue 100 reporters who haven’t watched a minute of their season draped in purple for two weeks…

 

They'll get Duke in the second round and go down in a heap of 28% shooting (either from the field, or the line, or both).

If they get the 5-6 seed they really deserve, they may go down earlier than that.