College basketball outlets — for breaking news or, in our case, news analysis and editorial commentary — have to be able to give readers a sense of what is actually happening or likely to happen on this day, more than any other day.
On Selection Sunday — Christmas Day for the college basketball community — the sport’s fans need to know what the Selection Committee is likely to do. Our resident bracketologist at Bloguin, Mike Ferguson, has provided continuous updates of his Bubble Breakdown series to keep you in touch with the evolving nature of the bubble. That base has been covered — you’ve been given a sense of where the committee stands with various bubble teams.
In this piece, though, just hours before the announcement of the brackets for the 2015 NCAA Tournament, it’s worth considering the way things SHOULD be, not the way things likely WILL be.
We all have our preferences as fans, as lovers of this or any other sport. I offer my wish list on this College Basketball Christmas Day not to suggest that my wishes are better than anyone else’s. (They’re not.) I offer this list in the attempt to speak for a lot of other fans with similar desires.
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5 – NO SEEDING ABSURDITIES
The creation of an NCAA tournament bracket is not just about selecting the 68 teams (or more precisely, the 36 at-large teams). Seeding and bracketing are equally important parts of the process. With respect to seeding, let’s acknowledge that this is an immensely difficult undertaking for the committee. Over the past few weeks, it seems that about 20 teams could be No. 10 or 11 seeds. If a back-end seed is placed at 11 instead of 9, or vice-versa, that doesn’t represent too much of a problem. Bracketing is a much bigger issue, such as having Kentucky as the 8 seed in Wichita State’s round of 32 last year.
However, there are occasions in which a seeding slot is cause for disapproval and some anger. Consider 2013, when an Oregon team that probably merited an 8 seed (a 9 seed at worst) was somehow seeded 12th. To be fair, Oregon was placed in the San Jose (Calif.) opening-weekend pod, a favorable geographical location which helped the Ducks in the end. (That was messed up, too.) Nevertheless, a seeding error of three seed lines or more is worth calling out. As long as those kinds of egregious mistakes are absent from the back-end and mid-level seeds (anything below a 6), I can live with the Selection Sunday bracket, even though I won’t agree with all of it.
4 – THE FIRST FOUR: AVOID SAME-LEVEL MATCHUPS
The First Four should ideally be a basketball laboratory, if at all possible. Power-conference schools face the same challenges and pressures. Teams in the Mountain West or Atlantic 10, two “tweener” conferences between the Power 5 level and the mid-major level, come from a different side of the tracks in college hoops. The American has some name programs such as Connecticut and Cincinnati, but it feels like a “less than Power 5” conference right now.
In the first Four, I’d much rather see a team from a Power 5 conference play someone from the Mountain West/A-10/American than another Power 5. Similarly, I’d rather see someone from the MWC/A-10/American play a Power 5 instead of someone else from the same fraternity. Mid-majors should not have to play mid-majors — not in the First Four, and not in the round of 64. They should meet only if they win their way into subsequent matchups (you know, like VCU and Butler in the 2011 Final Four).
Here’s an example of what the First Four should — and shouldn’t — look like:
BYU (West Coast Conference) versus Indiana (Big Ten)? YES.
BYU versus Davidson (A-10)? NO.
Colorado State (Mountain West) versus Temple (AAC)? NO.
Colorado State versus LSU (SEC)? YES.
Get the picture?
3 – BRACKETING COMMON SENSE
The 2014 NCAA Tournament was won by Connecticut. The Huskies played the best basketball of any team and deservedly won their championship. Full stop.
That said, it must still be acknowledged that the Huskies were placed close to home, despite having a seed (7) which is supposed to result in geographical locations far removed from a home region. UConn stayed in Buffalo for the opening weekend, and that pod fed into a New York placement for the East Regional, where the Huskies had the equivalent of home games in the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight. That was a massive bracketing error, a grade school-level mistake… and UConn ran with it.
Please, committee, no mistakes like that in 2015.
2 – A HOME FOR MURRAY AND CENTRAL
The regular-season champions of all one-bid conferences should not be given preferential treatment as far as the NCAA tournament is concerned. However, teams such as Murray State and North Carolina Central — which both went unbeaten in regular-season conference play — should receive special consideration as teams that have earned their way into the tournament. This generated a lot of debate on our staff, to the extent that three of our writers at TSS offered nuanced solutions to what can generally be referred to as “The Murray State Problem.”
If I ruled Bracketville and could determine who gets in and who doesn’t, I’d reserve two at-large slots for Murray and North Carolina Central. Those teams dominated for two whole months. Texas and Oklahoma State — including conference tournament games — went 9-11 and 8-11 in their conference seasons. If I’m honoring the regular season, I should want Murray and Central in my March mansion instead of a middling sixth- or seventh-place tem from a power league.
1 – NO KENTUCKY-WISCONSIN REGIONAL PAIRING
The above four items all matter, but if they are sacrificed so that Kentucky and Wisconsin are bracketed properly — such that they don’t have to meet until the Final Four and, ideally, the national championship game — I will be able to live with this Selection Sunday. I imagine a lot of other college basketball fans would be able to do the same. If this matchup is going to take place, it has to occur on the sport’s biggest stage — the one in Indianapolis, not the Midwest Regional final in Cleveland.
