In Reply to: I don't think seeds matter this year. posted by Bruinfan4ever on February 02, 2025 at 19:16:58
I've always viewed the tournament in a bit of a different way. Won some office pools back in the day (but that may have been because, being a UCLA alum and fan and living and working in DC, I knew more about western basketball than my colleagues did).
To win the NC, not counting the play in games, a team has to be able to win six games without a loss. This in a tournament in which every game is against tougher opposition and nearly all are different from the last opponent - personnel, matchups, ability on defense, on offense, play fast, play slow, different matchups.
I rate each teams by the range of games - out of six, under those conditions - each team might be reasonably expected to be able to win.
You know, figure this team could win 3 or 4; that one 2 or maybe 3, this one four or fi e, but those two could win five or six.
There are teams you look at and you think they could try well win six. I haven't seen Arizona in a while and as you say, they're on a nice run. But it's really hard for me to see them winning six out of six against tournament competition. There are some teams I have seen I think could win six. Duke is looking like it might have that potential. Auburn and some others have faced top competition and survived it - one point or not. That's impressive. But there are a number of teams that fit that category.
So if Duke and their wonder boy can't get it done, you could make a good case for a number of teams that figure to win 3-5 games. And if you're a lot more up on this than I am, you could find a few you could justify taking that to 4-6 games.
I don't watch enough different teams to really figure it out at this point. But I do know that in pools I've been part of, the folk who figured since upsets happen they would just pick a few upsets. They never won. Because what that reasoning meant was they were looking to pick some teams that really didn't figure to win. I preferred to pick teams I really thought did figure to win - based on matchups, record, coaching, whatever.
Do let us know what you decide - wishing you luck!