March means college basketball. Sunday night, the brackets were revealed and it left a lot of viewers scratching their heads at some of the decisions the committee made. For one, Syracuse and Tulsa made it, but Monmouth didn’t. Monmouth played 17 true road games and beat Notre Dame and USC along the way. Syracuse shouldn’t have made the tournament and that’s something that a lot of people will agree with me on. The Orange lost 5 of their last 6 games. Another head-scratcher was how Virginia got the #1 seed over Michigan State. Virginia lost in their conference championship game while Michigan State won their conference outright and won their conference tournament.
On the bright side, we have one of the best play-in games in tournament history. Vanderbilt will play Wichita State in one of the first four games to see who will be the 11th seed in the South region.
There are a couple of teams that are on upset alert in my eyes. I could see the #13 seed in Iona take down the #4 seed Iowa State in the Midwest region. A.J. English is going to be a huge problem for Steve Prohm and the Cyclones. In the South bracket, I could see UNC Asheville take down Villanova. I don’t think Villanova is as good as people make them out to be and I think they could easily be upset by the #15 seed in UNC Asheville.
My predictions for the Final Four are as follows:
Kansas will face Oklahoma and North Carolina will face Michigan State.
I have Kansas beating Oklahoma by a score of 74-69 and North Carolina beating Michigan state by a score of 64-62.
In the championship game, I think Kansas and their deep team will be too much for North Carolina. North Carolina has more stars, but Kansas has a lot more depth and team play. If Kansas plays to their potential, I don’t see any team that can knock them off.
Championship game prediction: Kansas 71-67 North Carolina.