College Hoops: Bracket Overreactions

• The Midwest is the toughest region that we’ve ever seen: Had they been in separate regions we would have put Georgetown, Kansas, and Ohio State all in the final four. Now we’re stuck picking between the three of them. Add to that Izzo’s crew, a Tennessee team with a chip on their shoulder for their low seed, a seemingly motivated Georgia Tech, and an Oklahoma State squad that beat the Jayhawks in the regular season and it may be hard to believe that Kansas was the tourney’s overall seed.
• We have no idea what will happen in the South: Duke is the most talented team in the region by a country mile, but do you really believe that the Devils won’t fall apart against a more physical team? We’d like Louisville to pull the upset in round two, but don’t know that they can top a Cal team capable of shooting over their zone.

Beyond he Dukies you have a Villanova team that has lost 5 of its last 7, a Baylor team without a win over a team ranked ahead of them, a Texas A&M squad with the same story, a Notre Dame team that wasn’t in the tourney two weeks ago, and Purdue without Robby Hummel. The safe call is to take Duke, but we’re leaning towards one of the Big East teams.

• Kentucky has the toughest individual road of all of the 1 seeds: While the Midwest is dramatically tougher than the East, Kansas will most likely have to face but two tough tests in a possible run to the final four. The other side of the region calls for most of the titans to knock one another off.

Kentucky could face a Texas team that was ranked number 1 in the nation at a time, and one of three teams that all cause big-time matchup issues for the Cats before a possible tangle with Big East tourney champ West Virginia.

• The committee’s doing everything it can to keep mid-majors from upsetting their precious major conference teams: Overall, 15 teams from mid-major conferences are seeded on lines 5-12 in the bracket. The committee has 8 of these teams playing one another, as opposed to seeing the best from the second tier conferences face quality high-major teams. Mathematically, that means there are pretty much the same amount of mid-majors playing BCS conference teams as aren’t, but we’d like to see the committee not over or under-seed a team just to keep the two sides away from one another. Seed the tourney out the way that it ought to be and let the chips fall where they may.
• Either Xavier or BYU will be in the final four: Seriously, we aren’t kidding. Just look at the West region. Anyone truly believe Syracuse has a run in them with Onuaku’s bad wheel? Is it feasible to believe that Kansas State’s turnover issues won’t surface against either the Cougars or Musketeers? Jimmer Fredette and Jordan Crawford are possibly the two most dangerous players in the tourney.