March Madness 2015: Game Locations You Must Consider Before Making Your Picks

There are many factors you have to consider when filling out a March Madness bracket, and a major one that gets overlooked is the location of each game.

The NCAA tournament selection committee attempts (sometimes poorly) to put the higher seeds as close to home as possible. This gives the top teams an even bigger advantage when attempting to make a deep run.

However, there are a few potential upsets throughout the tournament that could be boosted by the location of the games. Here is a look at the most notable situations prior to the Final Four.

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Georgetown in Portland, Oregon

When the bracket was announced, Georgetown players and fans probably had a great deal of initial excitement when the team was given a No. 4 seed. However, the celebration probably ended when the rest of the details were released.

The Hoyas have their hands full with a scary No. 13 seed in Eastern Washington, featuring the nation's leading scorer in Tyler Harvey. Georgetown senior Jabril Trawick discussed his mindset coming into the game, via Gene Wang of The Washington Post.

"We’ve got to be urgent. We’ve got to pay attention to detail," Trawick said. "We can’t come out slow because every team in the tournament, they’re playing for something. They’re excited to be in the tournament, so we’ve just got to be ready. We’ve got to be prepared. Preparation is important for us."

Of course, the difficult opponent isn't the only thing this team will have to worry about. Georgetown will have to travel to the other side of the country to play in Portland, giving a squad such as Eastern Washington a big advantage.

With Utah also likely to have plenty of fans in the region, it will be difficult for the Hoyas to live up to the seed and win two games.

North Carolina in Jacksonville, Florida

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Being in the West Region is bad enough for North Carolina, but the first two games won't be any piece of cake either. With Duke and Virginia earning the coveted Charlotte regional, the Tar Heels will be forced to play in Jacksonville.

As Joe Giglio of The News and Observer noted, the squad hasn't fared too well recently when not playing in the state of North Carolina:

The Tar Heels should be able to take care of Harvard in the first game, but a matchup against Arkansas could be extremely interesting. These two teams play very similar styles with a fast-paced attack featuring great offensive rebounding and athletic guards.

All things being equal, North Carolina likely has the advantage based on talent alone. However, the squad had just a 2-3 record against tournament teams in games outside of its home state. Those wins were over No. 10 Ohio State and No. 11 UCLA.

This could lead to problems for Roy Williams and company.

Arizona in Los Angeles

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Portland isn't exactly next door to Arizona, but the Wildcats should be able to take care of business in their four-team pod.

Texas Southern could be scary after beating Michigan State during the season, but it won't be able to handle Arizona for 40 minutes. Either VCU or Ohio State has the talent to pull off an upset, but either will struggle scoring against this type of elite defense.

This will set up an intriguing set of games in the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight. ESPN's Jeff Borzello broke down his thoughts on the region:

With all the teams being close, especially Wisconsin and Arizona, it likely can come down to location. The regional semifinals and finals will be in Los Angeles, which is certain to feature tons of well-traveling Wildcats fans.

After filling up the MGM Grand in Las Vegas for the Pac-12 tournament, these fans will be ready to make the difference en route to the Final Four.

Follow Rob Goldberg on Twitter. If it's March, I'm talking about pretty much nothing but college basketball.