Thoughts on the Elite Eight

I'll have my Elite Eight picks tomorrow because I don't feel like writing them out since it's nearly 3 in the morning.

I said it in the Sweet 16 round and I'll say it for this next round. This is the strongest field of final teams I've ever seen. Let's look at the remaining teams.

Florida: SEC Champ
Oregon: Pac-10 Champ
Kansas: Big 12 Champ
UCLA: Pac-10 regular season champ
North Carolina: ACC Champ
Georgetown: Big East Champ
Ohio State: Big Ten Champ
Memphis: Conference USA Champ

So that's the major six conferences' tournament champion, an extremely good Memphis team from a has-been power conference, and UCLA who was the dominant team in the Pac-10 this year but was eliminated early in the tournament. We have whittled the field down to eight teams and there is still no clear favorite for the title. When the weakest team is the Pac-10 champ and a #3 seed, you know the final seven games are going to be wild.

I also did the calculations for winning the national title again for this round. Here's the new ranking.

1. North Carolina 24.74%
2. Kansas 21.96%
3. Florida 18.83%
4. Ohio State 11.04%
5. Georgetown 8.73%
6. UCLA 7.83%
7. Memphis 5.36%
8. Oregon 1.50%

As you can see UNC took back the lead over Kansas. I figure it was due to UNC had a more impressive margin of victory over USC than Kansas did over Southern Illinois as these calculations can be changed due to scoring. Still, the "favorite" has a greater than 75% chance of not winning the title. That's remarkable at this point.

My List of Eight's odds improved slightly but not much from last round. I only lost Texas A&M.

No team improved their odds more than Memphis last round. Probably because that was the only team I didn't expect to advance from the Sweet 16 that did so. Beating Texas A&M more than doubled their odds of winning it all.

Georgetown and Kansas were the only teams to lose ground in the odds probably due to their very close victories. In fact, since the tourney began, Georgetown and Ohio State are the only teams to lose ground from their original odds. Ohio State's is definitely because of needing huge comebacks against Xavier and Tennessee. I think Georgetown might also have to do with now having a 100% chance of having to play the "favorite" UNC. But it should be a close game. There will definitely be no "gimmes" from this point on.

Only two teams left to ruin my List of Eight as I mentioned. Memphis is starting to scare me (especially as they were the last team I excluded.) Ohio State has looked the weakest of the #1 seeds so I figure that is the most likely #1 seed to get knocked out of the next round. Oregon has improved their odds more than any team remaining but I'm still not sure about them as they've played Miami (Ohio), Winthrop and UNLV. To finish the job they'll have to win against Florida, either Kansas or UCLA, and then one more to win it all. Possible but I don't see it.

Will this be the year that all four #1 seeds make the Final Four? Before we get all excited, remember we had all four #1 seeds in the Sweet 16 last year and three in the Elite Eight. None made it to the Final Four. Of course last year was filled with crazy upsets and the theme of this year's tourney is the dominant teams have advanced. But we'll see this weekend.

Picks coming tomorrow as I said. Have a good night.

Jeb's Tourney Picks: 45-12