I took the 1-68 Master Seed List released by the NCAA and plugged it into a bracket, looking for what bracketing rules the committee followed, ignored, or just got wrong. Below are my comments:
1. There was debate as to whether the committee would put the top 2 seed in the same region as Kentucky. It is only 293 miles from Charlottesville to Cleveland, bus distance per NCAA rules. However, they sent the Cavaliers to Syracuse (which requires flying) instead. This shows that the committee clearly did not want to penalize the Wildcats with the top 2 seed.
2. Maryland was ahead of Louisville on the S-Curve and is closer to Syracuse than Cleveland. Therefore, they should have gone to the East Region and sent Louisville to the Midwest, which would have also been within driving distance for Louisville. For some reason the committee sent Maryland to the Midwest and Louisville to the East though. Perhaps they wanted to avoid a Kentucky-Louisville game again in the Sweet 16, but they are not supposed to look that far ahead for rematches.
3. There was some debate whether Wisconsin would go to Columbus or Omaha, but the committee went by straight mileage and sent them to Omaha.
4. Notre Dame’s pod was sent to Pittsburgh even though the second Columbus spot was open at the time. This makes no sense at all to me. They are both within driving distance, but Columbus is 120 miles closer to South Bend. Worse yet, the team that got the Columbus spot was Maryland — which would have been closer to Pittsburgh!
5. North Carolina was also passed over for the second Columbus spot and sent to Jacksonville, which is 60 miles further away from Chapel Hill.
6. It is almost 200 miles further for Arkansas to go to Jacksonville as opposed to Columbus. However, West Virginia, below the Razorbacks on the seed list, was given the 5 seed spot in Columbus, most likely because this is able to put one of the two teams on a bus instead of a plane. I have no problem with this switch.
7. Another switch I did not understand on the 6 line. Providence was sent to Columbus while Butler went to Pittsburgh. It is closer for both teams to be in the opposite site and would not have violated any other rules on this line. I am starting to suspect the committee needs a geography lesson on where Pittsburgh and Columbus are.
8. Oklahoma State could have been easily swapped on the 9 line with LSU, avoiding an Oregon-Okie State rematch from the 2013 tournament, which is supposed to be a consideration. Apparently, this was ignored to keep Okie State in Omaha and closer to home. I have no problem with this.
9. Davidson should have gone to Charlotte, which is in their backyard and was available. However, the committee flipped them with Georgia, sending the Wildcats out to Seattle. The logic may have been to avoid a home court disadvantage for Michigan State and Virginia, but the protected seed rules are only supposed to apply to the top 4 seeds in the Round of 64.
10. Slotting BYU in was amazingly easy on the 11 line despite their bracketing requirements. The committee lucked out there.
11. Eastern Washington was sent to Portland instead of Seattle which is slightly further. I believe this was to avoid a team from the state of Washington playing in Seattle and have no problems with it given that as a 13 seed, their round of 64 opponent is supposed to be a protected seed.
12. On the 16 line, Coastal Carolina could have gone to Charlotte to play Duke, but was sent to Omaha instead. This was also probably a conscious move to help protect Duke’s #1 seed form a semi-local team and shows me that the committee was doing some extra work to avoid any potential claim of a home court disadvantage by a top seed. I have no problem with this switch either.
13. Finally, there was some concern that the committee would adjust the bracket because of travel issues with charter planes this year. Clearly, that was not a factor for them at all.
Hoops HD Mock Selection Committee Report: Sunday, March 15th
Bracket Below Updated at 4pm, est
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Last night, the committee selected the entire field, seeded the entire field, scrubbed the entire field, and set up contingency plans for the games today. UConn was not selected as an at-large, but if they win they will land at #47 on the seed list, which places them on the #12 line. If they lose, then another spot in the field will open up, and Temple will make the field as our final at-large selection. The fact that they are in the same conference as UConn is a coincidence. That did not factor in to the decision.
As you can see below, the teams that were considered but did not make the field as at-larges are Colorado State, UConn (who is still playing), Georgia, Illinois, Murray State, Texas A&M, Tulsa and UCLA.
I realize that many bracketology sites are projecting that Georgia is not only in the field, but safely in the field. Quite frankly, we don’t care. If the actual committee takes them it would not surprise me because I see how a case can be made, and I see how they’ve done things that this committee has a tendency to like. Same with Colorado State and Tulsa. Our committee did not like them. Although we go through the same process the real committee does and use the same procedures and information, we really aren’t all that concerned with guessing what a committee of people we don’t really know are going to do. We are more into analysis than we are fortune telling, and aren’t really worried too much about what our final “score” is when it comes to matching what the real committee does.
Having said that, I do think Wisconsin will get a #1 seed from the real committee if they win today, and perhaps even if they don’t. I also think that Colorado State will make the real committee’s field. We are going to scrub our bracket one more time, and we make one or both of those changes ourselves, but I’d venture to say that Colorado State probably will not be voted in to ours.
Below is what our board looked like after we finished last night. Below that is a preliminary bracket based on our seed list, but it is not the final bracket. I checked it and I don’t think there are any mistakes, but it was 4am, I don’t have the software that our chairman has that immediately point out errors, so if there are any, a thousand pardons. I realize Butler v Indiana is a rematch, and that the committee likes to avoid those, but in this case I felt I had to move too much around to avoid it. That, and who the hell wouldn’t want to see those two go at it again??
Georgia Southern and Georgia State are also accounted for. Georgia State will be a #14 seed, whereas Georgia Southern would be a #15 seed.
THE BOARD
THIS IS OUR FINAL BRACKET IF SMU BEATS UCONN. We had to move BYU v Miami from the #11 down to the #12 line, and Wofford up to the #11 line to meet bracketing rules
THIS IS OUR BRACKET IF UCONN BEATS SMU. No teams had to be moved off their natural seed lines
NOTES ON THE BRACKET
-The biggest teams we had disagreements on were Butler, Louisville and SMU. Some of us felt that Butler was clearly better than Louisville, and made several motions to get the two switch, but by that point we needed seven out of ten committee members to agree with the motion and it could not pass.
-Kyle Lamb and Lee Delvecchio were very much against SMU, and they ended up motioning several times to move them down. Some were against it, but they were able to convince the majority, so the teams were moved.
-We do feel that the real selection committee will give Wisconsin a #1 seed, and that they will either replace Duke or Virginia. Some of us feel Colorado State is getting in to the real tournament, but not everyone. Many of us also feel Georgia is getting in to the real tournament, but that they do not belong in. We feel they will replace either BYU or Temple, most likely BYU.
It’s up to the committee now. It’s called Bracketology, but I actually hate that term. It’s a qualitative process that basically consists of ten individuals conducting a year long examination. You can quantify what it will approximately look like, but you cannot quantify the entire thing.