The Odd 16:  Let’s Face It, this Field is Weird

We celebrate the under-rated, the over-achievers, the “we’re not supposed to be here!”s.  

And we should.  In somebody’s else’s column.  

Here, we are going expose the losers, underachievers, the over-rated, and the truism outcome of continuing to ply the field with Power Conference teams (like real basketball, the teams that get up the most shots usually win).

The Power Conferences – ACC, Big 10, Big East, Big 12, PAC 12, and SEC – put 35 teams in the Tournament, which includes a ton of At Large bids. 

The Mid-Conferences, MWC, AAC, and WCC, (they all sound like imitations of other, more popular conferences) put 9 teams in, counting FAU, which, in news exactly nobody cares about, is dumping Conference USA to join the AAC next year.

The remaining conferences all had 1 team make the tournament.  Let’s call them the “Onesies.”

The Losers

Losers don’t qualify as “Over-Rated” when nobody has heard of them, and if we did, we would expect them to lose.  Hello, MWC.  With 4 teams in,  a 2-3 overall looks even worse with SD State at 2-0, as the other 3 teams got choked out in Round 1.

Princeton alone has as many wins.   Mountain West Conference, wherever you are, I STILL don’t see you.

The Over-Rated

We all love the Big 12, and Big 10.  So athletic and strong!  They beat up each other all year, they’re so good, it’s like a mini-NBA.  14 teams among both conferences made it.

Well gosh.  Their cumulative record is 13 and 12, all against other conferences.  

The Big 12. A #1 seed (Kansas), and a #3 seed (Baylor) have been bumped off.  Neither Iowa State nor TCU upset anybody before they got bounced.  As #2 and #3, Texas and K-State did what they were supposed to do.

The Big 10.  I watched Purdue once, it was all I could stand and told me all I need to: their talent and style, in addition to being barely watchable, doesn’t scale to speed, and they get run over.  

Penn State represented, and we love Jalen in the Rock, and Izzo always shows up.    But with only one team  in the Sweet 16, after putting 8 – 8! – teams, this league, personified, couldn’t beat Lizzo in a game of 1 on 1 dodge ball.

The Rest.  If you are a 1,2, 3 or a 4 seed and you’re home, you’re over-rated.  Big 10 and Big 12, make room for Marquette and Virginia, and just because of the false hype despite well-deserved middling seeds, Kentucky and Duke. 

The Guy With the Most Bullets Wins

Yes, the Power Conferences have 11 teams in the Sweet 16.  But they put in 35, less than 33%.

That’s a good night for Otani or Trout or Westbrook, but not an impressive winning percentage.

The Middies represented at 7-4, with 4 teams in the Sweet 16.  

That’s 4 out of 9, a dream night Otani, Trout, or Westbrook.

The Onesies placed 24 teams in, and have 1 left.  A slump for Otani and Trout, a regular for our guy Westbrook. 

The high-level argument could go either way.  But the deets matter.  Princeton won a lot of close games this year, then won handily in Rounds 1 and 2.   That’s an argument that their regular season was tougher than we thought.

The Big 12 lost to lower-ranked teams from allegedly inferior teams.  Their lower seeds surprised nobody, and got put down with relative ease.  Ok State is dominating  … the NIT.  The Big 10 survives only because of the implacable Izzo, who LOOKS like the Big 10, a craggy, jagged, plump sorta guy ya never wanna see in a bathing suit, or get in a fight with.

Leagues like the AAC and WCC got little love.  Too many At Large bids went to Power Conferences, essentially validating conventional wisdom, instead of creating more interesting stories.

This is the Odd 16. Let’s see if it gets interesting.

Next: The Tizzle’s “Odd 16” results, and Elite 8 predictions!