Second set of games

Looks like I should have taken my own advice. I mentioned earlier this week that the most dangerous 12 seeds are the ones from small conferences that get ignored in the media, and specifically mentioned Montana as the most glaring example. But I was too intent on finding the better opponent to knock of an over-rated Boston College in the second round, so I took Nevada. Serves me right. I hope I did help some of guide your brackets towards Montana, though.


As for the Tennessee game, that game was not an indictment of Tennessee's seed as much as it was of the disrespect the selection committee shown towards Winthrop. That team should have been a 13 seed, a 14 at the worst. As a 15 seed they probably constituted the best 15 seed in tournament history. This is a team that won at Marquette, and lost at Alabama and at Memphis by a grand total of 13 points. The team was also constituted of players with tournament experience, which is something that the committee claims to care about. Last week I even mentioned them with Iona and UW-Milwaukee as one of the mid-major tournament champions that would be very difficult to beat by anyone in the first round. This was a glaring mis-seeding that was ignored in the media simply because so few people follow this minor conferences. It was much easier to complain about Cincy's bid, or about George Washington's seed. As for Tennessee, I'm still confident that they are a very solid team. I think they should handle Wichita State on Saturday before proving a tough opponent for whoever makes it out of Dayton.

Finally, Marquette v Alabama. I started writing this post when it looked like Marquette was done for (down 8 points with under 6 minutes to go). But this game is not over yet. Marquette needs to pull this out to save face for a Big East conference that called itself the best conference ever but has so far not looked like it. As of this posting, Marquette is down 1 with under 30 seconds to go. Stay tuned!