5 major takeaways from the 2018 NCAA tournament bracket reveal

The 2018 NCAA tournament bracket is set. With the decisions of the NCAA tournament selection committee still fresh in all our minds, let’s look at the five biggest takeaways from this year’s March Madness field.

Last year, it was the South Region featuring North Carolina, Kentucky, and UCLA as its top three seeds that immediately caught everyone’s attention on Selection Sunday. All three marched onto the second weekend, and after Kentucky disposed of UCLA in the Sweet 16, they dropped a buzzer-beater to North Carolina in one of the more memorable regional finals in recent memory.

This year, it’s the Midwest Region that’s drawing similar attention. Kansas, as tends to be the case, is the top seed in the Midwest. A quick glance at the bottom half of the region reveals Duke and Michigan State creeping around as the two and three seeds, respectively.

Just as the case was with two and three seeds Kentucky and UCLA last season, the Blue Devils and Spartans already met once early in the season. In what was then a battle of the top two ranked teams in the country, Duke won a high-scoring affair at the Champions Classic, 88-81. The Spartans will have to hope recent history repeats itself, as Kentucky exacted revenge for an early season loss to UCLA in the Sweet 16 a year ago.

Poor Virginia.

The Cavaliers have clearly been the best team in college basketball this season, and they have the tournament’s overall No. 1 seed to prove it. Their reward for this? A potential Sweet 16 showdown against one of the hottest and most talented teams in the field of 68. And there are multiple options here.

Kentucky and Arizona are each coming off major conference tournament triumphs, and each possess more pure talent than 98 percent of the rest of the teams in Division I. But before we can start talking about what would undoubtedly be the sexiest matchup of round two, both those teams have to get by two of the most dangerous double-digit seeds in the tournament.

For Kentucky, the opponent is red-hot Davidson, whose only loss since Feb. 9 came in triple overtime against Saint Bonaventure. For Arizona, it’s a Buffalo squad that dominated the MAC and faced five NCAA tournament teams during the non-conference portion of its schedule.

At least the Bulls fans in Boise should have an easy time differentiating themselves from the other three teams in their pod.

I have a long-held theory that the potential second-round matchup featuring a No. 1 seed that everyone wants to see never winds up coming to fruition. Typically, the game features a talented but underachieving major conference team that falls into one of the 8/9 “death games,” and immediately leaves fans predicting a second-round upset. That team always* loses its first game.

You want to see Colin Sexton vs. Villanova, I want to see Colin Sexton vs. Villanova, the whole world wants to see Colin Sexton vs. Villanova. Which tells me that we’re not going to get to see Colin Sexton vs. Villanova.

It would be remarkably fun though.

NCAA tournament selection committee chair Bruce Rasmussmen revealed during the selection show that Notre Dame was in the field of 68 before Davidson’s one-point win over Rhode Island in the Atlantic 10 championship game on Sunday stole the Irish’s bid.

I get that Notre Dame dealt with more injuries to key players than the average team this year, but having the Irish that close to making the tournament still seems remarkably short-sighted.

Notre Dame was a good team when it was fully healthy, sure. The Fighting Irish won the Maui Invitational, walking over Division II Chaminade and lowly LSU before beating a good Wichita State team in a game the Shockers led 95 percent of the way. Besides that, there’s not much there. Mike Brey’s team was hammered by Michigan State, it lost to Indiana on a neutral court, and it suffered an embarrassing home loss to Ball State. Again, this is all before preseason All-American Bonzie Colson and second leading scorer Matt Farrell began battling injuries.

The limited sample size with Colson back on the court and the team back to full strength is iffy as well. Notre Dame lost a competitive game against Virginia to end the regular season, they barely beat 8-24 Pitt in the first round of the ACC tournament, overcame a 21-point deficit to beat Virginia Tech (a No. 8 seed in the Big Dance), and then lost by 18.

We all wanted to see Notre Dame at full strength for this year. We all want to see every team at full strength for each entire year. If the Irish had been absolute world-beaters with Colson healthy, then I can see giving them the benefit of the doubt despite their overall resume not being up to snuff. They were not close to being world-beaters when they were at full strength at the beginning of the season or at the end of the season. They were also a bottom tier ACC team when they were dealing with these injuries in January and early February. This is all why having Notre Dame as the first team left out of the Big Dance makes little sense.

For years, Gonzaga has been on the receiving end of a billion “they’re not making it past the Sweet 16” immediate hot takes following the release of the bracket on Selection Sunday. The change in perception for that program following last year’s breakthrough appearance in the national championship may start to show itself over these next few days.

The Zags were supposed to be down this year, but back next season. Instead they’re one of only four teams in the field that has already won 30 games, and they’re likely to be a trendy Elite Eight pick despite being a No. 4 seed. Mark Few’s team gets UNCG in round one, then should have a manageable second round game against either Ohio State or South Dakota State. After that, a date against Xavier would likely loom in the Sweet 16. No one likes a chalky bracket with all four No. 1 seeds playing in regional finals, so don’t be surprised if you see a host of folks picking Gonzaga to take out what would appear to be the most vulnerable of the four teams on the top line.

It would be quite the role-reversal for everyone’s favorite non-mid-major/mid-major program.