Winners and losers from March Madness bracket reveal on Selection Sunday
Today at 09:15 PM
One of the best days on the college basketball calendar is here and the bracket bonanza is in full swing. On Sunday afternoon, the NCAA Tournament selection committee revealed the official March Madness bracket, and there are plenty of storylines to hit on during the countdown to the best postseason in sports.
North Carolina? Who needs to beat good teams! Did West Virginia just get the 2025 version of 2023 Florida State football? Wait, Louisville is seeded what? Does the Big Ten Tournament even matter?
All of these things jumped out during the reveal, as well as the official end of Mike Woodson’s career as the head coach at Indiana.
On the less controversial side, some teams got good draws and some teams got bad ones. Who are the winners and losers of the hypotheticals on Selection Sunday? Let’s get into it.
Winner: Michigan State
Tom Izzo always has his guys ready to go in March, and now he has some fuel to fire them up with after the Spartans were knocked off by Wisconsin in the semifinals of the Big Ten Tournament. Outside of that loss, Sparty was playing some of its best basketball of the season in February and March and will surely be a tough out for just about anybody in the NCAA Tournament.
Michigan State came into the day essentially locked in as a No. 2 seed after winning the regular season title in the Big Ten, and it got a very friendly draw to possibly make a deep run here. Izzo and company will open up with Bryant before a second-round game against either Marquette or New Mexico. Marquette is talented and has an elite scorer in Kam Jones, but Michigan State should be able to dominate that matchup on the boards and overwhelm the starter-heavy Golden Eagles with its depth. If it’s New Mexico, Michigan State has a ton of bodies to throw at star guard Donovan Dent and can overwhelm Richard Pitino’s squad with its talent on the wing.
In the Sweet 16, Michigan State would likely face either Iowa State or Ole Miss. The Cyclones have lost Keshon Gilbert for the season and will be offensively challenged without him, and Ole Miss would get dominated on the inside by the Spartans. In the Elite Eight, Michigan State was drawn with Auburn, which appears to be the most vulnerable top seed at the moment. Overall, Izzo and company got a nice path to potentially make another Final Four run.
Loser: Michigan
Michigan State fans are loving this so far, aren’t they? The Wolverines were punished by this draw in more ways than one, and the Big Ten Tournament champions will have their work cut out for them if they want to make a similar run in the NCAA Tournament.
Michigan opens up with a very good UC San Diego team that is probably being under-seeded just a bit after winning 30 games in the Big West and picking up a road win against Utah State out of conference. Michigan’s guards are the weakness of its team and they will have their work cut out for them in this matchup. The Wolverines turn the ball over more than any other team in the field outside of Mount St. Mary’s while UCSD leads the entire field in forcing turnovers, so expect the Tritons to be a trendy 5-12 upset.
If Michigan gets through that game, it will most likely have to play against a very physical Texas A&M team that leads the nation in offensive rebounding. Michigan could also play Yale (in a Danny Wolf revenge game!), but the Aggies would present a big challenge that would be unique to this Michigan squad that is prone to getting pushed around a bit despite its size on the interior.
Michigan’s draw in the first weekend is as bad as it gets, and part of that stems from Dusty May and company being slotted as a No. 5 seed despite winning the Big Ten Tournament. But then again, has the Big Ten title game, played just before the selection show, ever meant anything?
Winner: Duke
Duke is already a big winner of this weekend with the news that Cooper Flagg is expected to be ready to go for the NCAA Tournament, and the selection committee was in no mood to rain on their parade. Duke dodged all of the most dangerous landmines on just about every seed line and should feel very good about its path to a Final Four for the first time under Jon Scheyer.
The Blue Devils open with American or Mount St. Mary’s before a possible matchup with Mississippi State or Baylor in the second round. The Bears are talented and I’m sure Jeremy Roach would love to get a shot at Duke, but the Blue Devils simply have too much size against a very small Baylor group. NBA scouts would be out in full force to see VJ Edgecombe take on Duke’s lottery trio of Flagg, Kon Knueppel and Khaman Maluach.
Duke would also be able to overwhelm Mississippi State on the interior to move on to a Sweet 16 game against either Clemson or Arizona (a very fun possible second round matchup in itself). Clemson is the only team that beat Duke in ACC play this season, so the Blue Devils would love to get some revenge from a road loss where the Tigers shot nearly 60% from the floor in a game that was marred by Maluach’s foul trouble.
Caleb Love is Duke’s well-known March nemesis, but Duke’s defense should be able to hound Arizona’s guards in a possible matchup between the two even though it would be a titanic battle in the front court. In the Elite Eight, the Blue Devils should feel good about not being physically overwhelmed by John Tonje and Wisconsin, and I would back Scheyer and company to get more stops against Alabama in the half court. Duke is a likely Final Four pick if Flagg is at full strength.
Loser: Florida
Florida might be the best team in college basketball and Todd Golden’s squad will be a trendy national title pick after steamrolling through the SEC Tournament with three comfortable wins over Missouri, Alabama and Tennessee. However, Florida’s draw is a gauntlet out in the West region.
Florida should be just fine during the first weekend, including a blockbuster game against Dan Hurley and UConn in the second round. However, even if the Gators can dethrone the two-time defending champs, the second weekend will be a bloodbath.
I am already salivating over a possible Florida-Maryland Sweet 16 clash. The Terps can get hot and have the bodies on the inside to match up with Florida in Derik Queen and Julian Reese. With Queen’s unique passing ability and Maryland’s willingness to play through the freshman big man on the offensive end, Kevin Willard’s squad is a very unique matchup.
The Gators’ Elite Eight seeds are also very challenging. No. 2 seed St. John’s is a team with big wings and the No. 1-rated defense on KenPom that is playing with a ton of momentum after sweeping the regular season and Big East Tournament titles. Rick Pitino knows how to win in March and the Johnnies will be a very tough out. No. 3 seed Texas Tech is a team that has an elite inside presence in Big 12 Player of the Year JT Toppin, but the Red Raiders can also run and gun and shoot the ball from anywhere.
Winner: North Carolina
Apart from a neutral court win against UCLA back in December, North Carolina picked up zero Quad 1 wins. Zero!! And it’s not like the Tar Heels were short on opportunities. Hubert Davis and company finished 1-12 in Quad 1 games, making their selection a rarity in the tournament.
North Carolina had its chances to beat plenty of Quad 1 teams, but the truth is that it didn’t. While North Carolina’s metrics are solid, especially a top 25 spot in BPI and a No. 33 ranking in KenPom, but the reality is that you have to win basketball games against good basketball teams. North Carolina did none of that.
Despite that, the committee gave the Heels a second chance, and the eye test backs them lately. North Carolina is playing some of its best basketball over the last month, and it will get a chance to take on a San Diego State squad that is slumping a bit to end the season. If UNC gets into the main draw, a date with Chris Beard and Ole Miss awaits. Two things are true here: North Carolina is lucky to be in, but it could also win multiple games in this tournament.
Loser: Louisville
Four ACC teams are in the bracket and three of them made it into winners and losers. Controversial conference! The Cardinals had an excellent season in the ACC before falling just short in the conference title game against Duke.
Pat Kelsey’s squad has great quality metrics, measuring out to a 23.3 average. It is 11th in strength of record, 23rd in the NET and 17th in wins above bubble — a metric that the committee chair specifically cited on television when backing the decision to include North Carolina. It also went 5-6 in Quad 1 games and 10-1 in Quad 2 games (the committee also used Quad 2 games to justify the UNC pick, which is ?) without a Quad 3 or 4 loss. 111 bracketologists on Bracket Matrix had Louisville mostly as a No. 5 or 6 seed.
Well, the Cardinals ended up on the eight-line, and their draw is anything but friendly. If Kelsey wants to get to the Sweet 16 in his first season as the head coach, he will have to find a way to beat Creighton and Auburn. Ryan Kalkbrenner is one of the best players in the South region, and Johni Broome is the best player in the South region. Have fun!
This could boil down to the committee knocking a watered-down ACC this season. Oh wait, North Carolina got in, so that’s clearly not the case. Whatever it was, Louisville got the worst shake out of all of the teams in the field by a mile.
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