Here is the final edition of bracketology before we get to the Selection Show! And I don’t know about you, but I’m really glad the tournament will return to its traditional Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday format this year. I’ve always thought that the opening Thursday of the tournament should be a national holiday, and it was just weird to have it start on a Friday last year (of course, that was far better than the year before…). Disclaimer: this feels like the most wide-open year as far as the cut line in a long time. I get that sense from doing my own work and talking with other bracketol ..read more

Here’s a quick update as we head into a night full of championship games! Since I last posted around 9 PM (Eastern) Friday, we’ve had a few notable results that have shaken up the bubble: First, VCU’s loss to Richmond pushes them out of the field. I was higher on the Rams than were other bracketologists; I now can’t really see much of a case for them given their relative lack of quality wins and mediocre metrics. Rutgers jumped back into my field this morning, when I tweeted a bubble update. Another key result happened since that tweet: Texas A & M dismantled Arkansas to pick up their sec ..read more

Welcome to tonight’s bracketology projection, as we go into the final weekend before the tournament! Tonight’s update is based on games from the final time slot last night through 8:00 PM tonight. So, there are some results that have just come in (e.g., Michigan State beating Wisconsin) that are likely to impact things but are not yet accounted for. The changes you’ll see from last night’s projection are mostly ones that it’d be crazy not to make, such as moving Indiana into the field. Their run the last two games – or really, the last 1.25 games – is true March Madness. If you’re not watching ..read more

There are three Thursdays of March Madness. This is the first, and we’ve already had a couple of teams come back from nearly 20 down in the second half today (Indiana over Michigan, TCU over Texas). Florida very nearly completed a comeback from 16 down late in the game against Texas A & M, before falling on a last-second 3 in overtime. All around the country, we’re seeing games go right down to the wire (St John’s vs. Villanova as I write this). It’s March! So, going back to something I brought up last night, let’s look at how the 1 line is shaping up. There are two teams that I think are ..read more

Welcome to my second bracket projection! In my 2022 debut last night, I told you that tonight, I’d take a closer look at how the field is shaping up. So let’s get right to the burning questions that are on college basketball fans’ minds at this time every year. First, who will be a 1 seed? For the sake of keeping this a blog post and not turning it into a book, I’ll dive deeper into the rationale behind my next statement tomorrow. But I think Gonzaga and Baylor are locked in as 1s, while Arizona, Auburn, Kansas, Kentucky, and Duke are in the running. Who else is safely in? So I think everyone ..read more

Here we go, Selection Sunday, one of the greatest days on the calendar, a day that should be declared a national holiday! *** This paragraph is an update at 3:30 Eastern, with Colgate having earned the Patriot League autobid and my decision to put Louisville in the field and drop Wichita State out. When I looked at it more closely, Louisville does have 5 wins vs. at-large quality or close to it teams. And simply put, I don’t think Wichita State’s wins vs. Houston and at Ole Miss will be enough to overcome their poor NET ranking of 72 (You can see below why I originally had it the other way aro ..read more

Here we go, the day before Selection Sunday, one of the greatest days on the calendar! At this point, most of the teams outside of the one-bid conferences are entrenched on their seed line, in my opinion. Also, from what we know, the Selection Committee doesn’t make a lot of changes from this point forward. So, with that in mind, here’s some insight into a few specifics in today’s projection. Oklahoma State is the biggest mover, rising from the 4 line all the way to the 2 line. Interestingly, I’ve been high on Oklahoma State since I started my projections in February. Their run as of late – mo ..read more

It was a rough day for bubble teams yesterday. Michigan State continued their incredibly inconsistent (sometimes incompetent) ways, going on their second 10-minute-plus field goal drought in their past 3 games and dropping a 68-57 decision to Maryland. Boise State lost to Nevada for the third time this season. And Syracuse came close to solidifying their case for a bid against Virginia, but fell on a buzzer-beating 3. As I wrote yesterday though, we had already hit the point where other than extreme cases, teams were likely to stay within a seed line of where they were. Michigan State was an 1 ..read more

After a couple days/nights of bids being clinched and some key wins for at-large contenders (Duke beating Louisville for example), we have a few shifts in the NCAA tournament projection. These are mostly towards the cut line, as the high seed contenders will be getting into the action today after receiving byes from the opening rounds of their conference tournaments. Generally speaking, I’d say just about every team is capable of rising or falling one line from here; in extreme cases, a team might rise or fall two lines. So, in my view, everyone from Michigan State (the 3rd team on the 11 line ..read more