After six days of scintillating basketball last week, the field of 68 has been whittled down to 16. As the excitement ramps back up this week, I wanted to provide some key points to ponder as you search for a way to make water cooler chatter more interesting.
Digest and regurgitate at your leisure:
FUN FACTS:
- The much maligned ACC boasts more teams in the sweet 16 than any other conference (3).
- There are as many teams from Richmond, VA as there are from the Big East Conference.
- There are (4) states with two teams in the sweet 16: Florida, North Carolina, Virginia, and Wisconsin.
- In adding up the seed numbers for each region, the following numbers are yielded: S'WEST - 34; S'EAST - 17; WEST - 11; EAST - 18.
- Marquette and VCU (both 11 seeds) represent two of the final six teams to earn at-large bids
- VCU and Ohio State are the only teams in the tournament who have yet to experience an anxious moment. Both have absolutely plastered their opponents.
- Butler's last four tournament games have been decided by a combined 7 points.
- #1 seeded Duke will travel over 2,500 miles to Anaheim, CA for their west regional game against Arizona.
- #3 seeded UConn will travel over 2,900 miles to Anaheim, CA to play San Diego State.
- CONFERENCE BREAKDOWN: ACC - 3; BIG EAST - 2; BIG 10 - 2; Mountain West - 2; SEC - 2; Atlantic 10 - 1; BIG 12 - 1; Colonial - 1; Horizon - 1; PAC 10 - 1.
MATTER OF OPINION:
- The team with the easiest path to the Final Four is Kansas. If they can escape 12th seeded Richmond, they would face either 11th seeded VCU or 10th seeded Florida State.
- The team with the most difficult path to the Final Four is Marquette. If they can knock off 2nd seeded North Carolina, they would face 4th seeded Kentucky, or the top overall seed Ohio State.
- The southeast region is completely up for grabs (Butler, WI, BYU and Florida).
- Highest scoring game of the sweet 16 will be: North Carolina vs. Marquette.
- Lowest scoring game of the sweet 16 will be: Butler vs. Wisconsin.
- Best players you've heard of: Jimmer Fredette (BYU), Harrison Barnes (UNC), the Morris twins (Kansas), Kemba Walker (UConn), Kyrie Irving (Duke), Brandon Knight (Kentucky), whoever has the ball for Ohio State (OSU).
- Best players you will know after this weekend: Derrick Williams (Arizona), Justin Harper (Richmond), Kawhi Leonard (SDSU).
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