Well, finally got a good look at this year's brackets.
Here's my first take on the games...
I've reviewed 42 brackets from other people, so called "experts", sportswriters mostly, who gave their first impressions. Some things they had in common:
a) not a single bracket had Boise State over Dayton in the play-in game;
b) not a single bracket had a #16 seed winning;
c) not a single bracket had Kentucky not making the Final Four;
d) every bracket had at least one #12 seed upsetting a #5 seed;
e) #8 seeds versus #9 seeds winners were about evenly split as were #7 seeds versus #10 seeds;
f) no one conference seemed to dominate the selections; potential winners were spread out...
What this means to me is that, with the lone exception of Kentucky, this may be one of the closest tournaments yet, with possible Final Four teams coming not just from #1 seeds and #2 seeds, but from seeds as low as say #7 (several "experts" had Michigan State as a Final Four selection; others had Wichita State)...
My personal takes:
There's not many teams out there that can compete with Kentucky. In no particular order I see Gonzaga, Virginia, Duke, Wisconsin, Arizona, Villanova, Kansas and extreme longshots in Wichita State and Michigan State as being the only foreseeable possibilities. No one else matches up at all, and even the teams I mentioned are there only because I can see them winning in a situation where they play nearly flawless while Kentucky plays their worst game of the year.
In early match-ups, there are many possibilities for upsets ranging from a lowly #15 seed down to the #9 seeds, with a smattering of #12 seeds, #13 seeds and #14 seeds being in the "one and done" category.
Many of these smaller conference champions are not that far removed from the Power 5 conference teams that they will match up with in the early games.
I don't see any obvious Cinderella teams. For sure, there will be one, a #12 or #13 or #14 seed that makes it into the Sweet 16, but at first blush I can't find them...
We shall see...
EK!!! |
