Ohio State could move up with a win Sunday, but will not be considered since the game will end too close to the deadline. BYU dropped a couple seeds with the MWC semifinal loss to San Diego State, and their great home court advantage doesn't work as well in the tournament.
5 UCLA (Pac-10) 25-8
12 Creighton (MVC) 26-7
UCLA will be seeded a line or two higher than they should in honor of their Final Four run in recent years. This is not as good a team, but they are still dangerous because of their history.
Creighton is in my last three in, but 26 wins and nine top 100 wins should be enough.
(For Maryland fans, though there have been teams below-.500 in conference that made the tournament, I am not putting Maryland in for that reason. If they would have beaten Duke, they would have made my bracket, because then their conference record and the tournament would be .500 (10-10), which is enough in the ACC.
4 Syracuse (Big East) 26-9
13 American (Patriot) 24-7
Great run by Syracuse again, but ran out of gas trying to play 4 7/8 games in four days and trying to beat two top-five teams during that run, succeeding once.
They moved up three seeds in my opinion because of this week. American could pull off a shocker if Syracuse can't recover, as had happened two years ago after winning four games in four days.
6 Utah (MWC) 24-9
11 Michigan (Big Ten) 20-13
Michigan's big-time wins gets them in the tournament. I think the committee still remembers when they beat Duke when Duke was playing like the best team in America.
10 top 100 wins and six top 50 wins add up to a good resume, even with 13 losses. Utah will be under-seeded because of a bad loss early, but it wouldn't surprise if me if they were as high as a four-seed. They might move up on the update.
3 Kansas (Big 12) 25-7
14 Akron (MAC) 23-12
Kansas lost a chance to be a two-seed by losing to Baylor in the Big 12 quarterfinals. They could still make a run, but they are really young, and might fall back into losing early.
Akron is a good team, and relies on tough defense, as they showed in the MAC final against Buffalo, but barely survived Toledo (the worst team in the MAC) in overtime to even get to the MAC final to win.
7 Tennessee (SEC) 21-12
10 Boston College (ACC) 22-11
Tennessee loses a heartbreaker in the championship game of the SEC, but I moved them ahead of Cal anyway. Boston College has three losses against teams not in the RPI top 100, which is a lot for a tournament worthy team, but is 9-7 in the ACC, which gets most teams in.
2 Connecticut (Big East) 27-4
15 East Tennessee State (Atlantic Sun) 23-10
Connecticut moves up to a one-seed if Duke loses, and if were healthy as a team, might be a 1-seed anyway.
Jerome Dyson's injury probably cost them a one-seed not too unlike Kenyon Martin costing Cincinnati a one-seed with his injury almost a decade ago. East Tennessee State came back after a short absence, but this time did so without cult hero Tim Smith.
That's my list. Hope you all are more informed than you were minutes ago.
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