Broken Brackets

Unfortunately I think there is a 97% possibility that Wisconsin will be a #2 seed even if they beat the Buckeyes for the championship today, although I hope I am wrong.

Quick shout-out to Jim Delaney: thanks for taking the big pile of cash from CBS to render your tournament championship game irrelevant most years (except for those times when a team needs to win to get in the tourney). To me it is a shortsighted decision because success in the NCAA tournament is worth more in exposure than the television revenues from a conference championship game. And success in NCAA tournament is certainly boosted by your conference teams receiving higher seedings. And your teams can't get higher seeds if the last game that two of your teams played isn't considered by the committee.

I also want to give a shout-out to the conference committee. If you do take the easy road and don't consider every game (and that includes the result from the Big Ten Championship), that is very cowardly. You guys have been sitting in a hotel room since Wednesday and you are telling me that you can't do two brackets: one if OSU wins and one if Wisconsin wins. CBS has paid $6 BILLION for the rights to broadcast the NCAA tournament 1999 through 2013 ($400 MILLION per year). Spend a little more money on assistants and computers and stop complaining about time constraints.

Now let's focus on the probable top 4 seeds in each region. Joe Lunardi has released his latest brackets and if Wisconsin is a #2 seed, I would be alright with this bracket. Here are how the regions would break out:

East
1. UNC
2. Georgetown
3. Texas A&M
4. Wazzu

South
1. Kansas
2. Florida
3. Oregon
4. Notre Dame

Midwest
1. OSU
2. Memphis
3. Pitt
4. Texas

West
1. UCLA
2. Wisconsin
3. Southern IL
4. UNLV

I really like how Wisconsin would match-up against Southern Illinois in a potential Sweet 16 game and UCLA in a Regional Final. Southern Illinois is a great defensive team, but can struggle on offense. In addition, they don't have alot of height upfront. Their two best players are their PG Tatum and PF Faulkner. Flowers can cover Tatum and the Badgers could rotate big guys on Faulkner.

UCLA is very small and they would be the smallest team to win the title. UCLA's best big guy is Lorenzo Matta and that is by default. Matta only averages 22 minutes a game and shoots very poorly from the line. UCLA struggled playing teams with height, losing to Washington and California in their last two games.

If the Badgers do get a #2 seed, they need to be paired with UCLA. I don't want to see Kansas, Florida or North Carolina before the Final Four.