The NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Committee has selected Gonzaga, Auburn, Arizona and Kansas as its No. 1 seeds in a mock bracketology reveal a month before Selection Sunday. The Zags were the No. 1 overall seed by a slim margin over Auburn.
The committee selected Kansas as the fourth No.1 over Baylor and Kentucky because of the number of wins over teams in Quadrant 1 and its road wins.
“You could make a case for all three teams, as Baylor has more Quadrant 1 wins than anyone and Kentucky doesn’t have any losses outside of the first quadrant,” committee chair Tom Burnett, a senior consultant to the Southland Conference, said. “Some head-to-head games involving those three teams certainly was a topic of conversation but as things stand today, we have Kansas with a slight edge.”
Purdue and Duke joined Baylor and Kentucky as No. 2 seeds, with Purdue getting an edge on Duke based on having more wins within the first quadrant and not having any losses in Quadrants 2-4. Villanova, Texas Tech, Tennessee and Illinois are the quartet of teams seeded third in their respective regions, while Wisconsin, UCLA, Providence and Texas rounded out the unveiling. Villanova’s strong performances on the road, in part, landed them ninth on the overall seed list, while Texas Tech’s win over Tennessee, Illinois’ recent win over Wisconsin and performances against common opponents UCLA and Providence faced, helped determine the sequence of teams on the back end of the list.
WEST REGION (SAN FRANCISCO)
1. Gonzaga
8. Duke
12. Illinois
16. Texas
MIDWEST REGION (CHICAGO)
2. Auburn
7. Purdue
10. Texas Tech
14. UCLA
SOUTH REGION (SAN ANTONIO)
3. Arizona
5. Baylor
11. Tennessee
15. Providence
EAST REGION (PHILADELPHIA)
4. Kansas
6. Kentucky
9. Villanova
13. Wisconsin
From here, it looks like the East is the most difficult region while the East is the easiest. But there is still a lot of basketball to be played After the announcement, Auburn, Tennessee and Texas all lost.
