Running 2023-24 NCAA Basketball Thread

I’m hopeful for a potential Grand Canyon-Alabama matchup.
That could be 130-120.

 

The women's committee had a sense of humor, too.

NCSU starts with a game against Chattanooga. Wes Moore, NCSU's current coach, used to be the head coach at Chattanooga.

On the other side of the sub-regional bracket – i.e., NCSU's next opponent should seeding hold up – is Tennessee. Kellie Harper, Tennessee's current coach, was the coach at NCSU prior to Moore.

Thank goodness it's in Raleigh. The Lady Vols having to make a trip to Raleigh because of seeding ... between this and NCSU's guys winning the ACC Tournament, I think I've seen it all now.

 

I'm going to be a dissenting voice here ... and I know just a bit about the team in-question.

Indiana State did not have a quality win. One Q1 win, and it was just barely Q1, a road win at Bradley. Good win. Hardly earth-moving though.

Yeah, Northwestern lost to Chicago State. They also beat Purdue, Illinois and Dayton to name a few. Indiana State didn't have anything to counter their bad home loss to the Redbirds.

A lot of times, when mid-majors are left out, it's because they didn't have the opportunity to play anyone. It's a huge problem, but Indiana State can't really make that claim.

Indiana State played Alabama and Michigan State, losing both. Against Alabama, they didn't have one of their leading scorers. But against Michigan State, they had a full roster and they lost by 12.

Most damning in the long run? Indiana State lost two of three to Drake. Once in Des Moines, which is forgivable, but when the chips were down in St. Louis? They were getting blown out for most of the game, made a nice comeback late, but couldn't close the deal.

That series represented their season in a nutshell. They couldn't close the deal when it mattered. They had lulls in several games they eeked out too, Missouri State and Illinois-Chicago to name a couple. They paid the price for those lapses in their one bad week with a loss to Illinois State and (more forgivably) at Southern Illinois.

And even despite all of that? It took a historic raft of bid-stealers to keep them out. They were victims of bad luck, not some conspiracy theory.

What should be more at question here is how valid the NET methodology is? Indiana State was 29 NET, but in every single one of the other resume-based, metrics-based rankings and ELO, they were in the 40s.

I'm gutted for their fans, who have been through a metric ton of shit over the years, and will go through more shit as their inept administration forced out the AD who was instrumental in hiring Josh Schertz, which will hasten his exit. He'll take a lot of those players with him. Right now, SLU is the leader in the clubhouse.

But for all of the romance from the Larry Bird-inspired headlines and the geeked-out vibe from Robbie Avila, they had a weaker case than some of the other MVC teams that also had their hearts broken on Selection Sunday.

And here's a dirty little secret about mid-majors in general ... if they would play one another as peers once in a while, they might not find themselves in this lack of quality win hell they perpetually find themselves in.

I'm speaking of the best of the mid-major leagues: the A-10, MVC, WCC, the Mountain West until recently, the AAC, etc. Notice they only rarely play each other because they want it both ways.

They want their share of tomato can low-majors on their schedules just like the high-majors do, and look on peer vs. peer matchups with disdain for the same reason the high-majors do ... they feel there's too much to lose and not enough to gain.

It's stupid. What's needed for mid-majors is a more enhanced version of the old Bracket Buster. Rather than play a 20-game conference schedule, drop it to 18, and use that weekend currently used for the early conference games in December and replace it with a mid-major invite in Vegas or something. Everyone goes and the competition is tiered into World Cup style groups so the best teams play the best teams.

That way you pick up (in theory) three quality games for your best teams. They suddenly have some quality opponents and the rising tide lifts all the boats once you get into conference play.

Not via that method, but the Mountain West has this figured out. They get some quality games, they pull a few wins, and suddenly, they get six teams into the NCAA Tournament, because once they're in league play, everyone is benefitting from the wins the Mountain West was able to get in nonconference play.

 

The women's committee also made sure LSU and Iowa were in the region so they could try and make sure there was a rematch -- and they made sure both were opposite South Carolina so the only way they play either is in the final. I feel like they did the same with USC and Juju, wanting to give potentially an Iowa-LSU match-up or a UCLA rematch in the semis before facing South Carolina in the final

 

I didn’t hear too much about teams being mis-seeded this year.
Come to think of it, I haven’t really heard too much of it since that hatchet job back in 2017 with Wichita State and Kentucky.

 

Got sent up there to spread their loving messages about IVF.

 

Have some more coherent thoughts after going over the bracket again...
* I was surprised that FAU was an 8 when I saw the reveal. But the Owls are right in line with the other 8 seeds in the NET, which are all in the 30-40 range. That's a pretty interesting draw for UConn potentially in the second round, because FAU is capable of beating anyone while also being capable of losing by double digits to someone like Bryant.
* I went into the day thinking the A-10 champ was going to get a 13, so I was a touch surprised at Duquesne as an 11 seed. DU finished 80th in the NET, VCU 71st, so the difference is negligible once you down to that area.
* I think St. John's has a bigger gripe than Indiana State for not getting in, but I'm also not sure who the Johnnies should replace in the field. I don't think it was very easy to parse between some of those teams down at the bottom of the bubble, but St. John's has some pretty tough losses on its resume -- Michigan at home comes to mind, as does a neutral loss to BC. They also lost 9 of 11 in the middle of the season. The six-game win streak was nice until you consider that three of them came against Georgetown and DePaul. This is where the NET not being the end all comes into play. St. John's is much higher in the NET than say FAU, but there's clearly more to parsing a resume than just that NET number.
* Dayton getting a 7 seed was something. They're actually an underdog against Nevada.
* That McNeese team will give Gonzaga everything it can handle. Saw them at VCU in November and came to the conclusion rather quickly that McNeese is not a typical, smallish Southland team. They're big and athletic and are in a quadrant where they can make some noise, especially if Kansas isn't fully healthy.
* Most vulnerable 2 seed? Could be Tennessee, which can be fantastic but is also fully capable of sharting down its leg as it did against Clanga last week. Arizona was done no favors either. I think they'll get past Long Beach but Nevada might be sitting there next. Tough matchup. Florida is fully capable of giving Marquette fits in round two. An Iowa State-Drake matchup in the second round would be pretty fun.
* I know it's happened a couple of times now, but I'm just not seeing a world where a 16 wins this year. UConn and Houston are too good, Purdue will be on high alert, and I'm not seeing Howard or Wagner taking out UNC.

 

The losses in the conference tourneys probably mean the one seeds will give their opening game their full attention.

 

And there's a second-round game looming between LSU and Louisville. Which would have LSU's Hailey Van Lith going against Louisville, after leading them to the Elite Eight last year and then transferring to LSU in the offseason.

 

Their occasional sense of humor reminds me back when Vermont upset Syracuse in the first round. A few years later, both schools were back in the tournament, and the committee matched them up again. Syracuse beat them that time.

And multiple decades back, both the Tennessee and Liberty women’s teams were the only undefeated teams entering the tournament. The committee put them against each other in the first round, and the Lady Vols destroyed the Female Fighting Falwells.

 

On the bright side, she didn’t call them the Holy Shits.

 

Cleveland State got a bid. Suck it, NCAA!