Michigan a 2 Seed, Will Face Montana
Michigan is the 2 seed with Gonzaga, and will face 15th seed Montana. The Wolverines were apparently the last #2 seed, but the draw isn’t so bad. The #3 seed is Texas Tech, and Florida or Nevada await barring an upset to the Grizzlies.
Montana is the Big Sky Champ, ranked #137 on Kenpom, can shoot, and forces opponents into a lot of isolation, sorta like another recent opponent I have no wish to discuss right now. Nevada is one of several #7 seeds that seem like they should have been ranked higher.
Sounds good to me. I'm just glad we stay out of Duke's region.
I can see it now:
Romp Montana, everyone goes nuts.
Beat Nevada, but look unimpressive, sunshine blowers push their “just win it’s okay” agenda.
Lose to Texas Tech (a good opponent): REFS REFS REFS!!!!
Nah, I’ve seen this scenario before. Michigan doesn’t lose in SoCal to a team from Texas.
Wat?
I can see it now too:
Michigan romps Montana, beats Nevada, then cruises by Texas Tech
northernmich enjoys the wins and hopes nobody looks at posting history, then defends it by saying "I was just being realistic".
Yes, Michigan could barely beat the ... #25 team per KenPom/#23 team per NET inexplicably seeded as a #7 seed. That would be fine.
But whatever, it's weird that anyone would want to post about how a team they ostensibly root for will lose, even if it's some weird cathartic self-protection, but that's your choice.
We got a favorable bracket, but I'm still going to be pleasantly surprised if we make it beyond the Sweet 16.
Nevada is really good.
All it takes is a few boneheaded iso plays from Poole or Iggy and Michigan is sweating it out.
Florida will beat Nevada
Why does everyone think our bracket is favorable it is tough. If you go y the BPI our bracket has 6 of the top 23 teams in it. Nevada is better than a 7 seed.And Gonzaga beat Duke this year and Florida State and Texas tech are great defensive teams. Texas Tech is #1 and I believe one of the best in the Kenpo. Era. Buffalo is a team I wouldn't want to meet up with either. Just seems like everyone is just relieved we dont ha e to face Duke until what the final if we or them make it that far?
If you laid out the other 3 brackets, you could say the same kind of thing.
It's the NCAA tournament, it's not a coronation. There are tough teams that can beat you. You can't advance without playing savvy, efficient basketball. As it should be. There is also some luck involved, as always.
But we have a very manageable bracket to the Final Four. There is nobody we will face that we can't beat if we play typical Michigan-in-March tournament-level play.
Yesterday sucked, but if we play like we did for the first 38 minutes . . . and then actually finish, we can realistically reach the Final Four.
I think every bracket is pretty even. I know people like to treat one as demonstrably harder than the other, but in a week we'll see a couple double-digit seed upsets and a top-ranked team lose a key player and it'll all even out.
Anybody wanting Gonzaga surprises me. The Zags aren't dominant but they are absolutely a top draw and could win it all if they can keep scoring like they have all year.
I want Gonzaga.
Because the choice isn't Gonzaga or Northwestern.
It's Gonzaga or Duke, UVA, UNC.
I'll take my chances with Gonzaga. Even versus UNC who is not going to be the same UNC we saw in the fall.
The number 25 team should be seeded...7th.
You know, because math. 24 teams can be seeded 6 or better. That leaves the 25-28th best teams with 7 seeds. Nevada isn't that good. I'm not even sure they'll beat UF.
That's not remotely how the seeding works. KSU, #24 in NET, is a 4 seed; Houston, #4 in NET, is a 3 seed. Teams get seeded for a number of reasons that have little to do with their quality or competency, and personally I think Nevada is underseeded as is, frankly, Cincy, another 7 seed that looks better than that seed line.
Uhhhh, I think you've probably already realized that your comment seems to have missed the point entirely, but I'll respond.
Your initial comment suggested that Nevada is inexplicably seeded 7th. I am fully aware that the seeding doesn't go by straight quality or competency which does cause some teams to be under or overseeded.
I am merely pointing out that by the most cited quality metric (kenpom) Nevada is seeded exactly where they should be. And quality is what Michigan is concerned about. They're 33rd in Torvik, 24th in Sagarin and 20th in BPI so the top 4 quality metrics are in a fairly tight range around 25-28 where 7 seeds should be.
Their NET is 23rd and their Strength of Record is 28th so the resume metrics put them there too. They are one of the few teams in the 4-10 seed range whose seed is highly explicable.
I would argue Louisville (22 in NET, 17th in kenpom, 18 in BPI) and Wofford (13!! in NET, 17 in BPI and 19 in kenpom) are the 7 seeds that their potential 2 seed foes should be complaining about. Fortunate Michigan missed those teams which are truly inexplicably seeded, Wofford especially!
If northernmich isn't a troll, he's one of those guys (like Maizen) who absolutely must win a dumb internet argument, to the point where he's genuinely conflicted when Michigan plays, as if we win he might look wrong on the internet, and he can't have that.
I agree with all your points, but #25 is technically a seven seed in a four bracket tourny. If Nevada is really #25, this is right where they belong.
If they seeded per ranking, sure. But they don't, as witnessed by teams like Houston and KSU being demonstrably off-seeded per their rankings.
Nevada looks better than the #25 team in the country to me, especially when you've got teams like Maryland and Miss. St seeded ahead of them.
Aren't you the guy that was predicting we'd miss the tournament after the Holy Cross game? Interesting bit of goalpost-shifting there.
Doesn’t seem like you have seen Michigan in the NCAA tourney for a while. ?♂️
Well, I can see your mom's nuts. So there.
For anyone wondering why we got Gonzaga and State got stuck with Duke: the Committee doesn't use a true s-curve. Within a seed, they prioritize distance over matchup. So State got "rewarded" by getting to stay in the Midwest, while Michigan gets "punished" by getting sent out to southern California where they have a billion fans.
I mean, I'll take it, but this is a bad process.
Congrats sparty.
They jumped Kentucky by winning today, so if they lose, they're probably in UNC's region.
That's one of the advantages UM has over smaller/less national schools; they have alumni EVERYWHERE, and they'll show up for those games. While some teams probably want the regional proximity for home court and (as we saw with MSU) get screwed a bit with the opponents, you can put UM basically anywhere and they'll draw in support.
I'm kind of wondering if that was more of an advantage than we fans realized when the Big Ten Tournament was in DC and NYC the last two years . . .
Oh I think we realized it. I knew a lot of people who went to those two.
I mean, out east UM is probably the most prominent team along with (maybe) PSU and Maryland. And in terms of alumni to show up it's no contest. That's why I never understood people getting made the game in MSG; it sucks for IU or MSU, but it's a home game for UM.
I was at the BTT in DC and it was a big advantage. Beilein and the players even said so.
We took over that place with our rafter-shaking DEFENSE!! DEFENSE!! cheers, and gave the tiring Michigan team a burst of energy down the stretch.
It really does matter, having a raucous crowd on your side..
I like this comment so I will post it for the third time: Michigan will start off on the heartland against Montana, beat a mid-major, head out to SoCal to beat a team from Texas, and then beat Florida St. to go to the Final Four. I know this because I have already seen this.
The only question is, who’s the Loyola-Chicago in the East that upsets Duke to go to the Final Four to lose to us?
Why not UCF? Have the storyline of Aubrey Dawkins playing against his former team in F4
When will they announce the time for each game?
Later tonight, I'd wager as the biggest fan base in Des Moines we'll be in the evening session.
True. I just don’t like when the game tips at 9:50pm or later.
Based on previous experiences, we'll be the last game on Thursday.
Which is interesting since, with NCAA insistence that these guys are legitimately student-athletes, then why schedule tournaments with do many weekday games involving long distance travel? This makes it very difficult for the students to actually attend classes. They could have easily made this a weekend only event by extending it for 1-2 weeks.
With MSU, Bradley, Minnesota, and Louisville all in Eastern/Central time, they will be the early session. Since Michigan's pod has both Montana and Nevada, that will be the late session. I hope we go first, at 7:15 or so, but I wouldn't be surprised to be the late game just because it's not expected to be close.
If you recall, last year we won the B1G and were pissed because Sparty got to play in Detroit and seemingly had the better draw for the tournament.
I think it’s fair to say that this year we got a bit of a makeup call from the committee.
Yeah, our draw kind of sucked . . . until all the upsets started happening.
Interesting to compare Montana from last year to this year.
Much worse on KenPom and Torvik (72nd, 89th respectively in 2018 compared to 137th on both this year). The big reason is their defense cratering from 56/69 to 161/167 this year. They did go from an awful 3 point shooting team last year (235th) to a great one (20th), but they only take 38% of their shots from deep.
They played 7 guys against us last year. All of them except for 1 are back (Fabijan Krslovic, a 6-8 big who played 34 minutes). This year they have 8 guys laying 20% of minutes or more, the 6 returning players plus two Pac-12 transfers who each play less than 50% of minutes. It seems like they're without Jamar Akoh for the season however, who played 22 minutes last year. Akoh is 6-8 who is Montana's highest Usage and ORTG player to Torvik.
Looks like their starting center is 6' 7'' and they bring a 6' 9'' guy off the bench for a few minutes a game. Here's to a monster game from Teske. Stay big and don't try to match their style with a small ball lineup.
A good draw all things considered. Michigan is a great team this year, not an elite team. Not as good as last year, but I think next year will top even that team. Just win.
I agree its a pretty favorable draw (although Nevada was pretty good most of the year and that could be a little troublesome). But I actually think this team is better than last year - they're definitely more talented than last year - but can they put it together the way last year's team did? Yesterday and Friday had me thinking they are in Beilein March Kill Mode, but that game today, man...
A deep tournament run would be nice and fun though.
I'm also hoping for a deep run. They just haven't looked great since December (when they looked like a title contender). The talent is better this year, but the team overall was better last year (matchups, offense, mental mistakes, etc) in my opinion. Hope they can somehow come back to where they started this year in the next week...
YEs - I think this team's ceiling is higher and I think the way they were playing in November/December was unreal. I think they were absolutely the best team in the country at that point. They've definitely slid since then but I thought they were getting back to that level of play vs Iowa and Minnesota and even the first half today before yet another meltdown. If they can get back to that level, everybody is in trouble.
But you're right - if they don't reach that ceiling and play together like last year they won't go far.
Florida is a one point favorite to beat Nevada in at least one place I saw.
I'm loving the prospect of playing in SoCal again. Let's get back there guys!
My undergrad school, Fairleigh Dickinson, gets Gonzaga in the first round! Go Knights, Go Blue!
I'm guessing MSU got hosed by the committee because of the devastating loss of Ahrens. So what's the word-are they going to have to amputate his foot?
Oh, you didn't hear? The funeral is today.
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