In Search of 68, Season Preview

You all know of my efforts–foolhardy or not–to predict the 65 teams in the NCAA Tournament in the past. Well, now my job got (ostensibly) harder this season, with the move to 68 teams. But rather than lament this new hindrance, I’ve embraced it. Here, for the first time ever, I’m trying to predict all 68 before the season even starts. Bold? You bet. Accurate? No way.

	EAST	SOUTH	MIDWEST	WEST
1	Duke	Michigan State	Ohio State	Villanova
2	Pittsburgh	Kansas State	Missouri	Washington
3	Baylor	Temple	North Carolina	Kansas
4	Florida	Georgetown	Memphis	Gonzaga
5	Illinois	Tennessee	Syracuse	Purdue
6	Virginia Tech	BYU	San Diego State	Butler
7	Kentucky	Minnesota	Richmond	West Virginia
8	Marquette	NC State	Florida State	Texas
9	UNLV	Texas A&M	Georgia	Arizona
10	UCLA	Maryland	Mississippi State	Wisconsin
11	Xavier	St. John’s	Notre Dame	Vanderbilt
12	Murray State v. Washington State	Old Dominion	Wichita State	Dayton v. Clemson
13	Utah State	Morehead State	Wofford	Ohio
14	Stephen F. Austin	Coastal Carolina	Western Kentucky	Weber State
15	Princeton	Lehigh	Lipscomb	UC Santa Barbara
16	Fairfield	Oakland v. Jackson State	Boston U. v. Morgan State	Quinnipiac

Cracking the NCAA Vault: The Best from 2010

I wrote—albeit briefly—about my love of the NCAA Vault late last season. For the uninitiated, the NCAA Vault contains every NCAA Tournament game from the Sweet 16 on played since 2000. That is 165 games in all. That is, in fact, too much for you to rationally sort through to figure out which games are worth skipping to the end, which games are worth perusing, and which merit full-blown opening-tip-to-final-buzzer immersion.

That’s why I’m here.

As part of our comprehensive college basketball preview over the next few days, I’ll be breaking down the contents of the NCAA Vault (and March Madness On Demand, which houses all 64 games from last season’s epic Tournament). Whether you’re in the mood to see a great individual performance, a team operating on all cylinders, or the moments when an eventual champion came closest to elimination, I’ve got you covered.

Sounds like gooooood watchin’.

The Five Games from the 2010 Tournament You Should Rewatch…NOW

Let’s be honest: The NCAA Tournament had hit a little bit of a late-decade rough patch before 2010. From the 2006 Final Four blowouts straight through to North Carolina’s romp through the field in 2009, there wasn’t a whole lot of memorable action (Mario Chalmers’ three and Stephen Curry, notwithstanding).

Every Game Counts…Week 11

In my neverending quest to rail against the BCS, I am calculating week-by-week how many games this college football season really “count” (as in, influence the national title picture).

After 10 weeks, 105 of the 120 FBS teams cannot make the BCS championship (a refresher on my criteria), including up-until-recently unbeaten Utah. We can start breaking it down a little more now that we’re reducing the field.

Teams Who Can Afford a Loss:

These are teams that are undefeated in a BCS conference or who have one loss while having started the year in the Top 10 (and so can conceivably, like LSU in 2007, make the title game with two losses). I’d like to point out how lenient I’m being here. The way this season is going, Alabama and Ohio State are likely the only schools on this list that could make the title game with a loss. Furthermore, we’re getting to the point where we have to mathematically consider whether it is even conceivable for a team to make it with two losses (looking at you, Virginia Tech).

Alabama

Auburn

Nebraska

Ohio State

Oregon