Survival of the fittest: Breakdown of NCAA tournament's Cinderella-less Sweet 16
For a delightfully dramatic and unpredictable NCAA tournament that has produced abundant bracket carnage, there is one thing missing from the Sweet 16.
Cinderella.
Any program that could even remotely answer to that name is gone. Ushered out. Only the historically and financially strong survive.
There are 13 teams from Power Five conferences still going. The three from outside that club are Gonzaga, Wichita State and Xavier, which bear no resemblance to mid-majors.
The Zags are a No. 2 seed making their 17th straight NCA tourney appearance. The Shockers are 95-14 over the past three seasons, made the Final Four in 2013 and went undefeated into the tournament last year. The Musketeers are in the NCAAs for the ninth time in the past 10 years, and have been to the Elite Eight twice this century.
They all belong with the elite.
To understand how dead Cinderella is, consider this: the lowest-seeded team in the Sweet 16 is No. 11 UCLA. Merely the program with the most national titles in history.
All told there are 10 programs still playing that have won national titles. Seven of them have won multiple national titles. This is a blueblood field.
And while a Sweet 16 without a true Cinderella loses some of its charm, it gains in competitiveness. There really isn't a team still playing that should be outmanned to the point of a mismatch.
There are three No. 1 seeds still standing, including top-heavy favorite Kentucky. But only 56 percent of the teams that were seeded to make the Sweet 16 did so. There were plenty of upsets to spice up the opening rounds.
In national title terms, the teams best equipped to battle the Wildcats are still in the field. That would be Wisconsin, Duke and Arizona. We'll see how many of them make it to Indianapolis.
In the meantime, here's a brief breakdown of who has survived and advanced:
Usual suspects: Louisville and Michigan State are in their fourth straight Sweet 16. Arizona is in its third.
Fresh faces: Notre Dame is in the Sweet 16 for the first time since 2003. Utah is here for the first time since 2005.
Strongest region going forward: West. Three of the top four seeds are still playing – No. 1 Wisconsin, No. 2 Arizona, No. 4 North Carolina. Two of those are conference champions who also won their conference tournaments. The interloper is sixth-seeded Xavier, which was aided by Georgia State's upset of No. 3 Baylor. There are high draft picks and heavyweight coaches aplenty in Los Angeles.
Weakest region going forward: East. The top two seeds have been shown the door. There are three teams with double-digit losses – North Carolina State with 13, Michigan State with 11, Oklahoma with 10. Louisville has eight losses, but finished fourth in its league.
Best regional semifinal matchup:
Wisconsin-North Carolina. Though Ken Pomeroy's ratings say it's No. 6 Duke against No. 8 Utah. Jeff Sagarin's computer also touts the Blue Devils (No. 2) against the Utes (No. 8).
Best potential regional final matchup: Wisconsin-Arizona. It was a one-point, overtime game last year for the right to go to the Final Four. A rematch of that would be just fine with everyone except fans of North Carolina and Xavier.
Strongest conference showing: The ACC. The top of the league looked good all year, and that was backed up in the first weekend. The ACC has five teams still playing, even with the round-of-32 knockout of Virginia. (You could see that one coming when the bracket was released – Cavaliers were staggering down the stretch of the season and Michigan State was playing well.) The bonus team for the ACC is No. 8 seed North Carolina State, which was the first team to bounce a No. 1 (Villanova). Honorable mention to the Pac-12, which had a pretty lousy year yet advanced three teams – and nearly all four that were in the field, before Oregon's scare of Wisconsin subsided in the final minutes.
Weakest conference showing: The Big 12. Iowa State got a No. 3 seed and flamed out immediately, in what ranks as the single worst performance of the tourney so far. Kansas flopped in the round of 32 as a No. 2 seed for the second straight year, as the early tourney busts continue to pile up for Bill Self (whose 2008 national title serves as a rather strong counterbalance). West Virginia and Oklahoma propping up what's left of league pride. Dishonorable mention to the Big East, which lost its best team prematurely (Villanova) and also has seen Georgetown, Butler, Providence and St. John's eliminated. It's Xavier or bust now for the Big East.
Luckiest team still dancing: UCLA. The Bruins have piled up good breaks. They were fortunate to even be in the tournament field after losing 13 games and going 11-7 in a sketchy Pac-12. But not only did they get in, they avoided going to Dayton for a play-in game. In the round of 64 against SMU, the Bruins benefited from a titanically bad goaltend call for the winning basket. And in the round of 32, they were handed a matchup with No. 14 seed UAB, which tied for fourth in Conference USA during the regular season. Steve Alford is encouraged to play the lottery this week.
Unluckiest team still dancing: West Virginia. The obvious reason is because the Mountaineers have to play Kentucky. But also there's this: West Virginia didn't leave the arena in Columbus, Ohio, until early Monday morning, which is about 30 hours after the Wildcats departed Louisville for the 75-mile drive back to campus in Lexington. So Kentucky can add a rest and preparation advantage to everything else is has going for it. (Another team at a scheduling disadvantage: Louisville, which played the late game Sunday night in Seattle – it ended about 11:50 p.m. ET. From there, the Cardinals had a long journey home and then go on to Syracuse to play a North Carolina State team that wrapped up its round-of-32 business early Saturday evening.)
Largest total victory margin through two games: Duke 48; Arizona 36; Kentucky 36; Gonzaga 29; Xavier 27.
Smallest total victory margin through two games: North Carolina State four; Notre Dame seven; Michigan State 13; Oklahoma 15; Louisville 15.
Sweet 16 coaches who have won a national title: Duke's Mike Krzyzewski (four); Louisville's Rick Pitino (two); North Carolina's Roy Williams (two); Michigan State's Tom Izzo (one); Kentucky's John Calipari (one). Plus UCLA's Steve Alford, who won one as a player at Indiana.
Sweet 16 coaches who have been to the Final Four: Krzyzewski (11); Pitino (seven); Williams (seven); Izzo (six); Calipari (three); West Virginia's Bob Huggins (two); Oklahoma's Lon Kruger (one); Wichita State's Gregg Marshall (one); and Wisconsin's Bo Ryan (one).
Records of teams against the Sweet 16: Arizona 5-0; Kentucky 3-0; Notre Dame 7-1; Wisconsin 3-1; Duke 7-3; West Virginia 2-1; Oklahoma 2-2; Gonzaga 1-1; North Carolina State 3-4; Utah 2-3; North Carolina 3-7; Louisville 1-5; UCLA 1-7; Wichita State 0-1; Michigan State 0-3; Xavier 0-0.
Person we'll miss most from the first weekend: Ron Hunter of Georgia State. His fall-on-the-floor reaction to his son's game-winning shot against Baylor is the single best moment of the tournament so far.
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