Kansas Jayhawks Size Up The Midwest Regional

The Kansas Jayhawks are the one seed of one seeds. At least in title.

You can see my initial thoughts here, and they have been accompanied by some good comments. Having now taken some time to digest—and also learn that the committee takes geography into account prior to their own S-curve—I’ve calmed and put some things in perspective.

First Round: Lehigh - Probably the toughest 16 seed out there—and we Kansas fans obviously don’t like getting a Patriot League team in Oklahoma City—but they’re still a 16 and we’re still a 1. If we can’t handle them, we weren’t going to do much damage anyway.

Second Round: UNLV/UNI - Many are talking about this as a dangerous game. Personally, I’m more worried about Lehigh. I’ve actually watched both of these teams play a couple times this year, and was never impressed. I do like the omen of possibly getting UNLV as our second round game…that went well last time.

Sweet 16: Michigan State/Maryland – Both of these teams are good quality, top 20 type teams. Basically, they’re A&M. Each of them can match us on the perimeter, but neither has any inside presence to speak of, and we should own the paint.

Elite 8: Ohio State/Georgetown – And this is why everyone calls it the toughest region. And deservedly so, as both have been playing great. Like almost all teams, we have no answer for Monroe or Turner. But those stars aside, these teams don’t create huge problems for us. Of the two, I’d rather face Georgetown—because our biggest weakness is probably defending the three—but both have extremely short benches, neither can take us out of what we do offensively, and we should dominate the glass against both. Long story short, this will be a really tough, hard fought game…but that’s what the Elite 8 is supposed to be.

And that’s the Kansas Jayhawks' road to Indy. I’m not sure what all the fuss is about.

This article originally appeared at: Oread Boom Kings

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