A Jersey Guy: NCAA Tournament Seeding Will Be Tougher Than Selecting
We are two weeks away from Selection Sunday, which is when 2020-21 college basketball season can officially begin.
Forget what you have seen since November when college basketball officials blew their whistles to signify the opening of the season.
None of made sense then, not much more makes sense now.
Schedules are uneven, the blue chip teams are struggling, Cinderella's have blossomed.
Now it is turning. Watch out for ""bubble'' surprises such as Duke, North Carolina and Michigan State finding their pace.
Watch aa some teams are staggering to their conference tournaments which really make no sense this season.
While this has been happening, the NCAA has been desperately putting together contingency plans for its tournament, which, after last year's last minute cancellation, will be held this year, no matter what.
The NCAA has already made some major changes, announcing it is holding the entire tournament in the Indianapolis area,
The change was the NCAA's effort to contain any COVID-19 isssues.
This week it made another major concession. Instead of 68 teams, 72 teams should prepare for the tournament. The first 68 will be part of the normal field. The Final Four will be alternates, on stand-by in case a selected team has COVID-issues and can not participate.
That option will end once the tournament begins, with teams facing opponents who can't participate simply moving on to the next round.
With all of that in mind, we will look at a potential field--not seeded because that is too difficult to do until all the regular season games have been played. And even then it will be risky business.
We will break down the process in a few parts
First some essentials. The field will include 31 conference tournament champions--down one this season because the Ivy League is not participating.
Of those conferences 20 will receive only one bid and 11 conferences will be multi bid leagues.
Here's our first best guess at the field.
One bid leagues (20)
1, Atlantic Sun--Liberty
2. America East-Vermont
3. Big South--Winthrop
4. Big West--UC-Santa Barbara
5. Big Sky--Eastern Washington
6. CAA--James Madison
7. C-USA--Western Kentucky
8. Horizon--Cleveland State
9. MAAC--Siena
10. MAC--Toledo
11. Northeast--Wagner
12. OVC--Belmont
13. MEAC--North Carolina A&T
14. Patriot--Colgate
15. Southern--UNC-Greensboro
16. Southland--SF Austin
17. SWAC--Prairie View
18. Summit--North Dakota State
19. Sun Belt--South Alabama
20. WAC--Grand Canyon
Multi bid Conferences (11)
1. AAC (2)--Wichita, Houston
2. A-10 (2)--St. Bonaventure, VCU
3. ACC (7)--Duke, North Carolina, FSU, Virginia, Virginia Tech, Clemson, Louisville
4. Big 12 (7) --Baylor, Kansas, Texas, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, West Virginia
5. Big East (4)--Villanova, Creighton, Seton Hall, UConn
6. Big Ten (9)--Michigan, Illinois, Ohio State, Iowa, Purdue, Rutgers, Wisconsin, Maryland, Michigan State
7, MVC (2)--Drake, Loyola (Illinois)
8, MWC (3) San Diego State, Boise State, Colorado State
9. Pac-12 (4)--UCLA, USC, Oregon, Colorado
10, SEC (6)--Florida, Tennessee, Missouri, LSU, Alabama, Arkansas
11. WCC (2)--Gonzaga, BYU