Baylor holds steady in latest NCAA Tournament Bracketology
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As we approach 2026, conference play is right around the corner in college basketball and ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi released his final NCAA Tournament projection of 2025 on Tuesday morning.
The Baylor Bears (10-2) have been playing with fire the past couple weeks by being one of the last four teams in last week’s projection. In the latest iteration from Lunardi, Baylor is out of the first four matchups and is a #10 seed in the West region. Their first round matchup would be against the #7 seed Utah State Aggies (11-1) in Portland, Oregon. The two programs have never met on the hardwood, and the winner would move on to face the winner of the #2/#15 matchup between Gonzaga and Furman. Portland has been kind to the Baylor program in recent years with a regular season win over Oregon.
Here is how the West region breaks down (in seed order): Arizona, Gonzaga, Illinois, Nebraska, Florida, USC, Utah State, Saint Mary’s, UCLA, Baylor, Tulsa, Akron, Liberty, Northern Colorado, Furman and Long Island. Within this projection of the West region, Baylor has a bit of familiarity with a conference opponent (Arizona). The two teams will square off in Waco on February 24th and the Wildcats are currently the #1 team in the AP poll.
If this tournament field holds, Baylor would have faced nine tournament teams in Arizona, #3 Iowa State, #8 Houston, #10 BYU, #15 Texas Tech, #16 Louisville, #17 Kansas, #25 St. John’s and UCF. A tenth opponent, Oklahoma State, is one of the first four teams out currently, so that number could go up. Baylor lost to St. John’s by 15 points on November 25th and will need to land a few upset wins in conference play to stay in the tourney field.
The Big Ten and SEC lead the way with 10 teams each projected to make the Big Dance, followed by the Big 12 and ACC with eight teams each. After easy non-conference wins versus Alcorn State, Southern and Arlington Baptist over the past 12 days, the Bears turn their attention to Big 12 play when they travel to TCU (10-3) at 2 p.m. on Saturday. Following the road trip to Fort Worth, a huge week awaits Scott Drew’s team when they host #3 Iowa State (13-0) and #8 Houston (12-1).
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Allen began covering college sports as an intern for InsidetheGators.com for the Florida Gators 2021 football season. He has been a freelance sportswriter for the past four years at newspapers such as the Ocala Gazette, Ocala Star-Banner and GatorBait Media. As a lifelong sports fan, Allen's dream is to cover sports every day.