I Think They Got it Wrong

First of all, I want to start this by saying that I am very, very reticent to criticize the NCAA tournament men’s Selection Committee because I think they have a ridiculously difficult job.  Not only do they have to sift through all the different resumes, but they have to do it with incredible pressures that you and I probably can’t grasp.  They have to juggle all of the following:

• Various different regulations that guide the seeding process, such as never having conference teams play until the elite eight (which I think has been waived, looking at this seeding) or random ones, like BYU’s refusal to play on Sundays, etc.
• The fact that they don’t have the time to know as much as the guys (Jay Bilas, Seth Davis, etc.) who will have 4 days and the ultimate forum (ESPN, ESPN.com, etc.) to evaluate and critique their final product.  These guys have other responsibilities, whereas the jobs of Bilas and Davis and company are basically to know everything there is to know about division-1 basketball.  And, with modern technology, they can do it.  That is not the job of the guys on the Committee–they have to run conferences and universities.  I am not saying that they do not take their jobs seriously, but they do have other things to do.
• Their own human biases, depending on for whom they work (many are conference presidents or university athletic directors, with ties formally or informally to many different people in the community that would be affected by the ultimate selections and seedings).  Let’s face it, we cannot expect human beings to be able to do this without at least acknowledging the fact that they are deciding the fates of people with whom many of these people have connections.  It’s not at all realistic to think that the Selection Committee members do not know Tom Izzo or Rick Barnes or the ADs at Florida or Georgetown.  I’m not saying that they act on these biases, but they do have to deal with them.
• Big money.  A wise person once told me that whenever there is a question about anything and you don’t really know the answer or even who is supplying the answer, follow the money.  You’d have to be a fool not to think that CBS and the NCAA and all the advertising partners, with all the money that they have at stake in this monstrosity of a fan attraction, that they don’t have some influence.  I’m not saying it’s undue influence.  I’m not saying it’s even explicit, but the guys in the room know this and if you don’t think that CBS and company are pulling for an easy road for Duke or the selection of Arizona over St. Mary’s, then you’re crazy.  Again, I’m not saying that the Selection Committee makes decisions based on these factors, just that they have to deal with these factors when making their decisions.

So, because of all of that, I have rarely (if ever) really criticized the Selection Committee.

Hating on the Little Guy
But I have a bit of a bone to pick this year, not because my team got the most glaring of the raw deals, but because I think that it seems to have been done a bit deviously (albeit clumsily) this time.  The deviousness of which I speak is in that it seems like they thought they could “throw us a couple bone” to distract us from their love of the “big guys” in the tournament.  Think about all the things that I listed above that the Committee has to deal with.  Two of them would undeniably push them to favoring the power conferences (CBS and their “friends” in the business, who are almost assuredly at the big money schools).  A third–the fact that they just don’t know as much–would probably lean them towards the names that they know.  If you had another job (which we all do), don’t you think that you would know a lot more about Maryland than you would about N. Iowa?  Granted, they have all the info in front of them and have been charged with knowing as much, but do they really?  So, the cards continue to be stacked against the mid-major in very subtle ways.

So, in a bit of a nefarious (be it intentional or subconscious) way, the Selection Committee gave all the benefits to the big guys and screwed the little guys yet again this year.  But, what is the difference, you ask?  The difference is that they knew from where the criticism would come and they nipped it in the bud.  They gave the final at-large to a WAC team and not an ACC team.  They gave eight at-large bids to non-power conferences, which is twice what last year’s committee did.  And, because they knew that they could just throw Utah St. and seven other bids at all the detractors, they got very elitist in the only other thing that they could affect–the seedings.  And, it’s a real shame because they did NOT do the little guys any favors this year.

Eight At-Larges?  Gee, Thanks 
Let’s take that for a second.  Yes, the Utah St. bid could have easily gone to Virginia Tech or Illinois or Mississippi St. and no one would have really been able to argue.  But, as for the eight bids to mid-majors this year?  Give me a break.  The Pac-10 had the worst season in its history.  Even in the softest bubble in memory, the SEC West division couldn’t get one team into the field.  The ACC was so down that, until Maryland’s late-season run, Duke was the only ranked team.  The Big Ten was supposed to be incredible this year, but they really only had four good teams.  Throw in the fact that the top four in the Mountain West could match up with the top four of just about any league in the country, save the Big East and Big XII.  Throw in the fact that the Atlantic 10 had SEVEN teams in the top 100 of the RPI–all seven of which were in the top 40, at some point during the season.  Throw in the fact that Butler, Gonzaga, New Mexico, and BYU were all ranked in the top 10 at some point this season.  What do William & Mary, Bradley, College of Charleston, Loyola Marymount, Portland St., Wichita St., South Alabama, San Francisco, Old Dominion, Evansville, Rider, VCU, and Idaho all have in common?  They are mid-major schools not playing in the tournament who beat a ranked team this year.  Wichita St. and Bradley each did it twice. 

So, what is all of this telling us?  It says–at least to me–that in an era where very few of the top-notch recruits play four years (many just one), there are significant reasons to believe that the mid-majors are more competitive than ever.  So, 23% of the at-large bids going to mid-major schools is supposed to be progress?  Come on.  Every time you hear the argument that the Butlers and the Sienas of the world aren’t talented enough to finish in the top half of the ACC or the SEC, just know that the Georgia Techs and Floridas of the world aren’t nearly disciplined or experienced enough to dominate the Horizon or the MAAC.  In fact, I think that Butler or Siena would be more likely to finish 7th in the ACC or SEC than Georgia Tech or Florida would be to utterly dominate (18-0 or 17-1) in the Horizon or the MAAC, like Butler and Siena have done.

So, the Committee did not do the mid-majors any “favors” this year, even if Utah St. was a borderline at-large over Va Tech or Miss St.

In Their Defense:  Change the F’ing S-Curve to Mean What It Should Mean
So, I started writing this post yesterday when I was really fired up about all the seedings.  But, then I listened to yet another interview with Committee chairman, Dan Guerrero, and I finally got an answer to my question about the S-curve when it comes to regional placement.  What I didn’t understand was that Guerrero and company came out and said flat-out that West Virginia was the top #2-seed.  They also defined Kansas, Kentucky, Duke, and Syracuse as the #1’s, in that order.  So, in a true S-curve, as everyone thinks it means, WVU would be the #2 wherever the worst #1 was.  In this case, it is Syracuse and out west.  Okay, well, the regulations say that you cannot have the 1- and 2-seeds in a region from the same conference.  Fine, put them in the South with Duke, right?  No, they are in the East with Kentucky.  BUT…that is not how the S-curve works here.  Apparently, the S-curve is for regional placement, not seeding advantage.  So, West Virginia is the best #2-seed, which does NOT mean that they are the #5 overall seed in the tournament, it means that they get first choice of region between the #2-seeds.  And, their REGIONAL preference would be the East, so they are put there.  Ohio St., the second-best #2-seed gets the preference of the remaining three regions.  Since they are in Ohio, they went to the Midwest.  Villanova, which could not be with Syracuse, ended up in the South with Duke, which meant K-State (which couldn’t have been in the Midwest anyway because of conference-mate Kansas) would go West with Syracuse.  And then it all starts over with the #3-seeds.

Okay, now that I “get” it, can I be the first to say–THIS IS REALLY F’ING STUPID.  Okay, I understand the rationale–you want the fans/students to be able to most easily enjoy their teams play, but I think it’s more like “we want these fans to BUY TICKETS to the games, and they will do that if they only have to travel to 500 miles to Syracuse and not 2500 miles to Salt Lake City.”  So, once again it’s all about money.  And, I’m confident about this because if you ask the average WVU fan (or student), I’m sure they would rather be the #2 with Duke in Houston than the #2 with Kentucky just because it’ll be slightly closer to Morgantown.  It’s not like Syracuse is a home game for the Mountaineers.  In fact, if you ask the biggest Mountaineer fan, he will flat-out tell you.  Bobby Huggins’ direct quote:  “I didn’t think we’d be a one-seed; I thought we’d be a two.  But, to be the third two-seed, I don’t understand that.”  So, yes, even Huggy Bear thought that WVU got jobbed by the Committee.  The only thing he is wrong about is that he wasn’t jobbed by the Committee, but by the system with which the Committee operates.  Let us PLEASE change this thing.

No More Defense:  Shameless Seedings
Okay, enough defending (or more like explaining it away), let’s get back to the point.  Most years the Committee does a fantastic job.  This year, they did an atrocious job.  The seedings this year are questionable, at best, downright ridiculous, at worst.

Let’s start with how this whole thing started–the Little Guys.  I tried, amidst my senseless rambling up top, to make the point that the gap between big-conference teams and small-conference teams is much, MUCH smaller than it has been in college basketball history.  The increased number of programs that pour big bucks into their basketball programs coupled with fact that the top recruits do not play four years leads to the shrinking of this gap.  Add the fact that the big schools’ lack of patience to stay with their coaches through difficult times, forcing them to go younger and fresher, enables the smaller schools to pick up quality, experienced coaches (Steve Alford, Steve Fisher, Todd Bozeman, Tom Penders, etc.) that they otherwise would have never been able to hire.  All of this sums to the fact that these little guys can play with the big boys.

But, like any other large bureaucracy with old people leading something with a long tradition, the selection process is taking FOREVER to adapt to the changing landscape of college basketball.  And, never has it been more apparent than this year with the seedings.

Because “it has always been that way,” the Committee doesn’t seem to realize that seeds 13 through 16 are not necessarily total RESERVED for automatic qualifiers.  If you think Utah St. or Minnesota or Florida snuck into the tournament, but you think that Murray St. and Cornell and Siena had great years, then why not put these teams in the 10-, 11-, and 12-spots?  But, that’s not the real shame of it all because I can see the argument that Murray St. would not have made it over Florida, so why seed them over Florida (I would contest which team is better, on a neutral floor, but I understand the argument because there is no way the Racers would have gotten in over the Gators).  The argument that I cannot see is the mid-major teams that the Committee deems as at-large worthy anyway not getting the benefit of better seeding.

Here we go.  The Temple Owls.  They won the regular season in a league with SEVEN top-100 teams.  They then won the conference tournament, beating two of those teams in the semis and finals.  They won 29 games, including wins over Xavier, Richmond, Dayton, Virginia Tech, Seton Hall, Siena, Rhode Island three times, and some team called Villanova.  They lost a one-point game to Georgetown.  They got a 5-seed.  Villanova, a fourth-place team who didn’t win a game in the conference tournament, got a 2-seed.  Maryland, whose non-conference scheduled featured big-time home wins over Charleston-Southern, Fairfield, New Hampshire, E. Kentucky, Winston-Salem St., FAU, UNC-Greensboro, and a huge 106-55 win over the Longwood Lancers, in their first year of D-I.  They did play hard, but dropped a tough one, at home, to William & Mary.  Their best non-conference win:  at Indiana.  Like ‘Nova, Maryland also failed to win a single game in their conference tournament.  The Terps?  A 4-seed.  Vanderbilt got a 4-seed on the strength of their 5th place conference season, one conference tournament win, and a non-conference schedule highlighted by just a home win over Missouri and a win at St. Mary’s.  They lost at home to Cincinnati and Western Kentucky.  In their defense, they did win at home against the juggernauts of Lipscomb, Tennessee St., Mercer, Manhattan, and Middle Tennessee.  Why did these four teams beat out the A-10 regular season and tournament champs, who have more good wins than all three of these teams COMBINED?  Because they play in major conferences.

But, don’t just cry for Temple.  N. Iowa is a ranked team that dominated a solid conference in the regular season and won the conference tournament in impressive fashion.  They got a 9-seed.  San Diego St. finished two game back and won the conference tournament of a league with four tournament teams, and got an 11-seed.  Butler was ranked in the top ten for most of the year and have won 25 straight games.  They are a 5-seed.  Siena has won tournament games in back-to-back season, has much of those teams there now, as seniors, dominated the MAAC, and got a 13-seed.  Old Dominion won 26 games, including an excellent CAA, and won at Georgetown, and got an 11-seed…you know, one seed below Florida, who finished fourth of six in the SEC East; two seeds below Wake Forest who finished fifth in a mediocre ACC and got smashed by Miami in the first round of the ACC tournament; and four seeds below Clemson, who finished behind Ga Tech in-conference.

These seedings are flat-out wrong.  I’m sorry.  I think the Committee usually does a great job and, while I have no compaints with who made it, I cannot forgive the absurdities of the seedings this year.  The landscape of college basketball has changed, we need those who organize it to catch up with the times.

Just one more quick note.  It kind of sucks that the Committee (with no intent, I’m sure) put Fran Dunphy against his former mentor, Tom Donohue.  These guys remain so close that they still won’t play each other in the regular season because they help each other out with each other’s teams, and they just don’t want to go against each other.  Now, they have to play each other in one of the biggest games of each’s career–and with both teams having serious aspirations of going far in this tournament?  That sucks.