At first blush, the Selection Sunday pairings for this year's NCAA Tournament read like the handi-work of a college fraternity mixer ... working on its third keg of beer.
**How can the bottom half of the East region have three Big Ten teams shoehorned into eight slots, when previous tournament selection committees placed a high priority on avoiding intra-conference clashes until the Elite Eight stage?
**How can the ACC warrant three No. 1 seeds (Virginia, Duke, North Carolina) for the first time in NCAA history, even though the Tar Heels didn't win the regular-season or conference tourney title?
Plus, UNC had already incurred defeats to Kentucky and Michigan – which ended up with 2-seeds.
**Speaking of North Carolina ... how is it fair that UNC would potentially have to play Kansas in the Kansas City regional (Sweet 16 round), even though the Tar Heels possess the highest seed?
(For years, the tournament committee has fought against rewarding lower seeds with home-court advantages during the first two weekends of NCAA action.)
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That aside, let's give the tournament committee credit for accomplishing one giant feat on Sunday: On paper, all four regions are eminently more balanced than previous years.
This is the result of the committee ignoring the complexities of seeding and scheduling around intra-conference possibilities ... and taking an S-curve approach to the 36 matchups for Round 1.
What's an S-curve? Looking at the bracket, the committee essentially seeds all 68 teams in this manner (1 through 16 for the four regions ... and then four play-in games for Tuesday/Wednesday):
1 2 3 4
8 7 6 5
9 10 11 12
16 15 14 13
17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 ... and so on.
As a result, we're left with some potential oddball matchups ... but less whining about the supposed strength of one region, or the embarrassing weakness of another.
For example ...
MIDWEST
TOP 40 TEAMS IN KEMPOM RANKINGS: 8
KENPOM TOP-40 AGGREGATE SCORE: 15 (the lower, the better)
TOP TITLE CONTENDER: North Carolina (1-seed)
ELITE SCORING MARGIN: Wofford (7), Houston (3), Utah State (8), Auburn (5), Kentucky (2)
BEST THREE-POINT SHOOTING TEAM: Auburn, Wofford
ELITE SCORING GROUPS: North Carolina, Wofford
ELITE DEFENDERS: Houston, Abiene Christian (15), Washington (9)
EAST
TOP 40 TEAMS IN KEMPOM RANKINGS: 8
KENPOM TOP-40 AGGREGATE SCORE: 17 (the lower, the better)
TOP TITLE CONTENDER: Duke (1-seed)
ELITE SCORING MARGIN: Duke, Michigan State (2), Belmont (11), Virginia Tech (4)
BEST THREE-POINT SHOOTING TEAM: Belmont, Virginia Tech
ELITE SCORING GROUPS: Duke, Belmont, LSU (3)
ELITE DEFENDERS: VCU (8), Liberty (12)
WEST
TOP 40 TEAMS IN KEMPOM RANKINGS: 8
KENPOM TOP-40 AGGREGATE SCORE: 20.2 (the lower, the better)
TOP TITLE CONTENDER: Gonzaga (1-seed)
ELITE SCORING MARGIN: Gonzaga, Murray State (12), Nevada (7), Texas Tech (3), Buffalo (6)
BEST THREE-POINT SHOOTING TEAM: Buffalo
ELITE SCORING GROUPS: Gonzaga, Buffalo, Murray State, Nevada
ELITE DEFENDERS: Texas Tech, Michigan (2), Florida (7)
SOUTH
TOP 40 TEAMS IN KEMPOM RANKINGS: 9
KENPOM TOP-40 AGGREGATE SCORE: 20.7 (the lower, the better)
TOP TITLE CONTENDER: Tennessee (2-seed)
ELITE SCORING MARGIN: Virginia (1), Tennessee
BEST THREE-POINT SHOOTING TEAM: Villanova (6)
ELITE SCORING GROUPS: Tennessee
SCORING DEFENSE LEADERS: Virginia, Kansas State (4), Old Dominion (14), Wisconsin (5)