I'll have a lot more stuff on the bracket in the next few days, but here are my initial impressions:
- I am shocked - SHOCKED - that Arkansas, Stanford, and Illinois are in the pool about Syracuse and Drexel. It just makes absolutely no sense to me. The Razorbacks were 7-9 in the very mediocre SEC West, and I believe they have something like 2 road wins on the year. Meanwhile, Drexel has 13 road wins (including Syracuse, Villanova, and Creighton), and Syracuse was 10-6 in the Big East (which is deeper and better than the SEC), and has wins over Georgetown (trendy champion pick), Villanova, and Marquette. An absolutely perplexing decision to put Arkansas in the field either any of those two. Or over Kansas St. or Missouri St.
- I like what Bob Huggins said... how important is the conference tourney draw? If Ole Miss loses to Florida in the SEC final instead of semifinal, are they in the Tourney instead of Arkansas? If you can't tell, the inclusion of Arkansas just baffles me.
- Upon first look, Florida looks like it has an absolute cakewalk to the Final Four. I really think Wisconsin is a weak 2 seed, and the top half of the bracket shouldn't pose too many problems. A hot shooting Notre Dame or Oregon team might be able to beat them in the Elite 8, but other than that I'm hard-pressed to see anyone else beating them before Atlanta.
- On a similar token, Georgetown doesn't look to have any trouble whatsoever getting to the Elite Eight.
- When I saw UCLA wasn't a 1 seed, I was praying they wouldn't be in Florida or Kansas' bracket... I didn't get exactly what I hoped for, but the Bruins could be playing with virtual homecourt advantage, as the first 2 games are in Sacramento and the next two would be in San Jose.
- I'll get into the best games of the Tourney in a post later in the next couple days, but there are two first round matchups that stick out to me as just being some fascinating games - Notre Dame/Wintrhop and Nevada/Creighton.
- Oral Roberts is a strong 14 and Washington St. is a weak 3 seed... very interesting matchup there.
- Have I mentioned that Arkansas and Stanford getting in over Syracuse and Drexel makes absolutely no sense to me?
- Offhand, teams that seem like they can win a Championship in my mind: Florida, North Carolina, Texas, Georgetown, Ohio St., Texas A&M, Kansas, and UCLA.
Much more coming up this week... for other stuff check out WBRS' case for Drexel, or the JCMJ Thoughts.
What stuck out to you?