Matt Slocum/Associated Press Georgetown is among the Big East’s seven nonfootball members that could thrive in a new conference. A variety of reports suggest that the seven Big East schools that do not compete in high-level football may split off to form their own basketball-centric athletic conference. Georgetown, Villanova, St. John’s, Marquette, Providence, Seton Hall and DePaul share a history of relatively successful men’s basketball programs, along with a heritage as Roman Catholic colleges. They have more in common with one another than they do with the other members of the Big East, which has diluted its basketball brand in its effort to remain intact as an elite football conference. A conference composed of these seven teams, along with select...
The long march of the Republican nomination hasn’t been very friendly to those political writers who were hoping to enjoy March Madness. But I did dust off the FiveThirtyEight N.C.A.A. forecasting model, which is back with a fresh set of projections for this year’s men’s field. You can find those forecasts here. The FiveThirtyEight tournament forecasts are probabilistic, and come to an objective estimate about the odds of each team advancing to each stage of the tournament. It is up to you to figure out how to use that information to fill out your bracket. It isn’t necessarily the case that you should always go with the FiveThirtyEight favorite. Many bracket competitions give bonus points for picking upsets or lower...
Last week, we established that Virginia Commonwealth had only about 1-in-820 odds of winning five consecutive games and reaching the Final Four. Although V.C.U.’s run ended with a loss to Butler in Houston on Saturday, the feat ranks right among anything else accomplished over the course of a single N.C.A.A. tournament; it was about as unlikely as Villanova winning the national title, as a No. 8 seed, in 1985.
But what about over the course of two tournaments? What are the odds that Butler would have reached the championship game two years in a row?
Somehow, my N.C.A.A. tournament bracket still ranks in the 76th percentile nationwide, a result which it owes to having performed very strongly in the first couple of rounds. It’s all downhill from here, however, since the bracket had all four No. 1 seeds advancing to the Final Four in Houston — something that, after Kansas’ […]
Jim Prisching/Associated Press Ben Hansbrough, left, and Notre Dame failed to advance in the men’s N.C.A.A. basketball tournament on Sunday. At some point during the second half of Notre Dame’s loss to Florida State on Sunday night, I started to imagine a New York Post back cover featuring a dejected-looking Ben Hansbrough, alongside a 72-point headline reading “BIG LEAST.” It’s hard for Big East fans, I know, but having spent most of my life in the flyover states of Michigan and Illinois, I can’t help but feel a bit of schadenfreude in the suffering of the Big East in this year’s N.C.A.A. basketball tournament. The conference has always seemed to get an outsized amount of attention. The Big East, after...
