Through various defections from other conferences, the NCAA basketball Big East Conference has turned into a monster
- Pittsburgh
- Notre Dame
- Syracuse
- Louisville
- St. John’s
- Cincinnati
- West Virginia
- Georgetown
- Connecticut
- Villanova
- Marquette
- Seton Hall
- Rutgers
- Providence
- South Florida
- DePaul
I am assuming the NCAA was so impressed with the size of the the Big East’s membership that it decided to send pretty much the entire conference to the NCAA tournament. 11 of the 16 members were invited. The only teams not invited had losing records. So, the message sent, pad your early season with early puff cakes and you’ll get in. Connecticut, Villanova, and Marquette didn’t even have winning conference records. Tossing in the RPI’s makes it look even sillier:
| Team | Wins | Losses | % | RPI |
| Pittsburgh | 28 | 6 | 82% | 13 |
| Notre Dame | 27 | 7 | 79% | 9 |
| Syracuse | 27 | 8 | 77% | 20 |
| Louisville | 25 | 10 | 71% | 18 |
| St. John’s | 21 | 12 | 64% | 25 |
| Cincinnati | 26 | 9 | 74% | 36 |
| West Virginia | 21 | 12 | 64% | 21 |
| Georgetown | 21 | 11 | 66% | 16 |
| Connecticut | 28 | 9 | 76% | 10 |
| Villanova | 21 | 12 | 64% | 48 |
| Marquette | 22 | 14 | 61% | 49 |
| Seton Hall | 13 | 18 | 42% | 105 |
| Rutgers | 15 | 17 | 47% | 128 |
| Providence | 15 | 17 | 47% | 157 |
| South Florida | 10 | 23 | 30% | 158 |
| DePaul | 7 | 24 | 23% | 234 |
All you apparently had to do was finish with a double-digit power index and you’re in. Nevermind that six of the eleven had double-digit losses.
So the NCAA goes out on a limb and just sends everyone from the Big East with a winning record. And promptly start touting this as something big:
Big East Sends Eleven Teams Dancing
By sheer volume, and some good and bad luck seeding, when it was all said and done, the absolute worst the Big East could do was send two teams to the Sweet Sixteen. Now, since 1 in 5 teams will make the NCAA tournament, the Sweet Sixteen is now the measure of success. So, regardless of how good or bad the Big East was, they’re going to send two teams to the final sixteen. No way on Earth they could send less. Worst conference in America? Don’t matter, they get two spots. No other conference I am aware of was guaranteed even one. The Big East got two. Worst possible scenario, remember peeps, is TWO for the Big East.
So, after the first weekend, you wanna guess how many teams the Big East is sending?
You got it.
Two.
The slaughter looked like a laundry list of what could possibly go wrong:
- Villanova was upset by George Mason in the first round.
- West Virginia lost to Kentucky in the second round.
- Syracuse was upset by #11 seed Marquette in the second.
- Louisville was upset by #13 seed Morehead State in the first.
- Georgetown was upset by #11 VCU in the first round, badly
- Notre Dame was upset by #10 Florida State in the second round, badly.
- #1 Pittsburgh was upset by #8 Butler in the second round.
- St. John’s was upset by #11 Gonzaga in the first round, badly.
- Cincinnati lost to UConn.
When the carnage was over, Connecticut and Marquette were left standing. They both got there after cruising the first round, and beating fellow Big East teams. Marquette is the only Big East team that actually upset someone else, Xavier. They then pulled a second upset, beating Syracuse. They of course, are from the Big East.
The NCAA Selection Committee doesn’t have a bunch of Big East members. And, they have plenty of basketball experience. So, I don’t get it. They’re just horrible I suppose. Or, more likely, trying to stack the tourney with larger schools to sell tickets and viewers. Sending the entire Big East along with seeding North Carolina and Duke at home and pitting two of three Kentucky teams against each other in the first round has left a bit of a bad taste on what should have been a real fun tourney for a Kentucky. The games have been good, but that’s in spite of the seeding not because of it. Duke winning by two at home and North Carolina winning by three at home would have been a lot more exciting to have read about the huge upsets they would have been if they had played anywhere else in the country. I do believe home court crowds, and officials, make about a 10 point swing in any game, at least.
NCAA tourney seeding, along with the bizarre system in place punishing schools for breaking rules just leads me to believe the NCAA as a whole is a broken institution and needs fixing real quick in very fundamental ways.
