College Hoops

[Rocco]

I read somewhere that the selection committee doesn't actually try to make match-ups. They typically just rank teams from top to bottom and fill them in... who knows if that's true or not.

I don't buy that. I know they say that and I can't prove them wrong but I have a hard time believing they don't consider matchups.

[Rocco]

@ESPNStatsInfo: Michigan State's 0 points in OT are tied for the fewest all-time by any team in an OT period.

You don't say.

Jamie Dixon's goal is to score negative points in OT one day.

[PghSkins]

I don't like Duke at all but they deserve a 1 seed

[PghSkins]

I'd like to thank the committee for basically handing Dayton a win over Boise on their home floor before bussing a whole 100 or so miles to their second round matchup vs PC.

[Dickie Dunn]

@ESPNStatsInfo: Michigan State's 0 points in OT are tied for the fewest all-time by any team in an OT period.

You don't say.

Jamie Dixon's goal is to score negative points in OT one day.

The NIT will be experimenting with a 30 second shot clock for the duration of the tournament. Won't surprise me if Pitt scores zero points against GW. Having his players attempt to run their offense before 30 seconds ticks off the clock is going to blow his mind.

[Orlando Penguin]

I read somewhere that the selection committee doesn't actually try to make match-ups. They typically just rank teams from top to bottom and fill them in... who knows if that's true or not.

Yeah, that's total BS. In this bracket alone, there's 3 glaring examples of manufacturing a storyline:

1. Manhattan is coached by Steve Masiello, who is a Kentucky grad. If they can beat Hampton then they get to face Kentucky.

2. Wichita and Kansas NEVER play each other. It's the kind of BS that doesn't make sense like why Georgetown and Maryland never play or why Cincinnati and Ohio State never play. So the NCAA will take care of that and set them up in the 2nd round should both win their 1st round games.

3. This is a bit more subtle but Larry Brown's first college job was at UCLA. He's coaching SMU now. Guess who plays each other in Round 1?


As for the discussion of Duke as a 1. Even though they didn't win either the regular season or the tournament, I still had them as a 1. Arizona had 3 losses outside the top 100 in the country while Duke had 0. Plus, the Pac-12 was incredibly mediocre this year and the ACC was probably the 2nd-strongest conference. Duke beat Virginia in their one regular season matchup (at UVA too...with a full roster) so they were always gonna get it over the Cavs.

[count2infinity]

After looking and looking, I realized it came from some dude that was on sportscenter that was previously on the selection committee and they asked for him to share the three biggest myths about the selection process. Them not setting match-ups was the only one that made me tilt my head and say "really?"... I don't even remember what the other two were.

[MWB]

I find it hard to believe as well. However, even if it was a completely random draw, chances are good that you would find matchups with interesting storylines. It is bound to happen matter what.

[count2infinity]

[Dickie Dunn]

Best NCAA tournament coaches since 2000 based on Wins Above Expectations (wins vs. expected wins based on seeding). A total of 298 coaches are on the list.

1. Tom Izzo - 12.42 WAE
2. John Calipari - 10.05 WAE
11. Sean Miller - 4.53 WAE
13. Ben Howland - 3.22 WAE
292. Mike Krzyzewski - (4.37) WAE
293. Jamie Dixon - (5.03) WAE

http://rotoviz.com/2015/03/which-colleg ... prise-you/

[slappybrown]

ouch

[PghSkins]

Patrick Chambers - 0 WAE

[Dickie Dunn]

First 1 vs. 16 upset coming Friday. Solid work Bobby Mo.

[pittsports87]

First 1 vs. 16 upset coming Friday. Solid work Bobby Mo.

[cma3585]

First 1 vs. 16 upset coming Friday. Solid work Bobby Mo.

No upset is coming. The committee focuses so much on bubble teams and their key wins vs key losses...how RMU can be a 16 seed with an 0-5 record vs tourney teams with no key wins while Pitt has 3 wins vs tourney teams, including 2 vs Notre Dame and UNC and two victories over another bubble opponent in Syracuse, just blows my mind. March Madness is not about the best 64 teams by any stretch of the imagination. Finishing 6th in ACC vs elite competition all year or 1st in one of the worst conferences in all of basketball with zero competition? If they loved these Cinderella stories so much, they'd make these teams prove year in and year out how dominant they are vs their competition to the point they'd move up to a higher conference, like Creighton and Gonzaga have done. NCAA tourney is a sham until things get fixed.

[Rocco]

First 1 vs. 16 upset coming Friday. Solid work Bobby Mo.

No upset is coming. The committee focuses so much on bubble teams and their key wins vs key losses...how RMU can be a 16 seed with an 0-5 record vs tourney teams with no key wins while Pitt has 3 wins vs tourney teams, including 2 vs Notre Dame and UNC and two victories over another bubble opponent in Syracuse, just blows my mind.

Because RMU won their conference and got an automatic bid?

[skullman80]

First 1 vs. 16 upset coming Friday. Solid work Bobby Mo.

No upset is coming. The committee focuses so much on bubble teams and their key wins vs key losses...how RMU can be a 16 seed with an 0-5 record vs tourney teams with no key wins while Pitt has 3 wins vs tourney teams, including 2 vs Notre Dame and UNC and two victories over another bubble opponent in Syracuse, just blows my mind. March Madness is not about the best 64 teams by any stretch of the imagination. Finishing 6th in ACC vs elite competition all year or 1st in one of the worst conferences in all of basketball with zero competition? If they loved these Cinderella stories so much, they'd make these teams prove year in and year out how dominant they are vs their competition to the point they'd move up to a higher conference, like Creighton and Gonzaga have done. NCAA tourney is a sham until things get fixed.

Please don't tell me you are saying Pitt should have been in the NCAA's. I'm as big a Pitt fan as one can be.. and they had no business sniffing the NCAA's. They had as many awful losses(if not more) then they had high end victories. They were not a good basketball team at all this year. Pitt had their chance to run the table at the end of the regular season to try and get in, and they lost 3 in a row, and then got beat in the ACC tourney. Pitt proved nothing other than they were a bad bad basketball team, that had a moment or two of good throughout the year.

[MWB]

The NCAA tournament is so good in part because of the Cinderella teams. No, it's not about the best 64, which is fine. Reward the lesser conferences. Who cares if a crap team like ucla gets in. If they win a game or two, not a big deal. If a lesser known does the same thing, it's interesting. Neither will win the title.

[skullman80]

The NCAA tournament is so good in part because of the Cinderella teams. No, it's not about the best 64, which is fine. Reward the lesser conferences. Who cares if a crap team like ucla gets in. If they win a game or two, not a big deal. If a lesser known does the same thing, it's interesting. Neither will win the title.

Yep pretty much this.

[meow]

How does a team get a home game in the tournament? That is Grade A bologna.

[PghSkins]

And that home non call is why someone else should have had the play in and Dayton should have been straight through with a 12.

[Orlando Penguin]

First 1 vs. 16 upset coming Friday. Solid work Bobby Mo.

No upset is coming. The committee focuses so much on bubble teams and their key wins vs key losses...how RMU can be a 16 seed with an 0-5 record vs tourney teams with no key wins while Pitt has 3 wins vs tourney teams, including 2 vs Notre Dame and UNC and two victories over another bubble opponent in Syracuse, just blows my mind. March Madness is not about the best 64 teams by any stretch of the imagination. Finishing 6th in ACC vs elite competition all year or 1st in one of the worst conferences in all of basketball with zero competition? If they loved these Cinderella stories so much, they'd make these teams prove year in and year out how dominant they are vs their competition to the point they'd move up to a higher conference, like Creighton and Gonzaga have done. NCAA tourney is a sham until things get fixed.

Sounds like we have an elitist amongst us. Teams like Robert Morris and Lafayette and Texas Southern are in NCAA Division 1. This is the NCAA Division 1 national tournament. Everyone has a chance to get into the Dance, some by easier means than others. It's bad enough we have the mediocrity of UCLA and Texas in this year's field. There has to be some reward for winning a conference, no matter how 'weak' it's perceived to be.

[Orlando Penguin]

And that home non call is why someone else should have had the play in and Dayton should have been straight through with a 12.

Sorry, not a foul. Defender had returned to the floor and was still in his 'space' when the Boise player tried to initiate the contact to get the cheap call. Boise screwed that one up by inbounding the ball to the corner...that coming after they decided to dribble the ball into a doubleteam in the corner and nearly losing it out of bounds. They deserved to lose that game after yakking that big lead they built up.

Dayton shouldn't have even been in this First Four in the first place. But because they're not a 'power 5 conference' school, they got busted down to play-in status while 'name' schools like UCLA and Texas, both severely mediocre skated through. Plus, the NCAA has been playing these games in Dayton for their entire existence because the city's people comes out for the games. Want to move them somewhere that fills 1/4 of the arena, if that? The beancounters at the NCAA wouldn't have that.

[MWB]

The real sham is that an automatic qualifier needs to play in what is essentially a play in game to get to the real tournament. If they're going to set it up like this, the bubble teams should have to play in those games. I'd also say that it's probably harder to win a conference than it is to finish sixth in a conference. Those teams know the only way they get in is to win. Power conference teams know they have a margin of error.

[slappybrown]

Agreed the play in games should all be at large teams