Plenty of teams prepare to jockey for seeding, selection tonight

In the immortal words of the Black Eyed peas, tonight’s gonna be a good night.

There are 40 teams in action tonight, and more than half of them are likely to appear in the NCAA Tournament or seriously challenge for their conference’s automatic bid. We’ve got elite powers like Kentucky, Missouri, North Carolina and Ohio State in addition to upstarts that could make life miserable for those powerhouses, such as Vermont, Valparaiso and Cleveland State.

Here’s some of the top games to track tonight.

• Kansas State at Missouri, 7 ET. The Tigers are looking to solidify their case for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament in addition to inching closer to their first regular-season title in the 16-year history of the Big 12 Conference. It’s also their last chance before bolting for the SEC next season. K-State wants to keep the mojo rolling after beating Baylor last weekend.
• Illinois at Ohio State, 7 ET. Poor Bruce Weber desperately needs a win for his Illini, who have lost five straight and eight of nine. But Ohio State should be playing plenty mad after losing at rival Michigan on Saturday prime time. The Buckeyes need to win to keep pace with Michigan State.
• Vermont at Binghamton, 7 ET. Vermont needs to win to maintain a tie with Stony Brook atop the America East standings. A lot is at stake as the top seed — which is the Catamounts right now based on their win against Stony Brook — would host the conference title game if they get that far. For Binghamton, the Bearcats are down to three regular-season chances to avoid a winless season.
• Xavier at Massachusetts, 7 ET. Xavier needs to find a road win against a winning team — something the Musketeers haven’t done since early December at Butler — to avoid falling out of the Atlantic 10′s top four, which get a bye in the conference tournament. UMass, for its part, is looking to move into the top four and set itself up for a bid-stealing run in Atlantic City.
• North Carolina at NC State, 8 ET. This might be the last stand for the Wolfpack, which desperately need a quality win or two to add to their résumé. The best wins thus far are against Texas in Madison Square Garden and at Miami. A loss to hated rival UNC would mean the Wolfpack likely need to reach the ACC Tournament title game to pick up enough wins to warrant an at-large bid.
• Michigan at Northwestern, 8 ET. Will the Wolverines suffer an emotional letdown a few days after a massive upset of Ohio State? Michigan has just two road wins, and the Wildcats could really use another solid win to boost its NCAA Tournament chances.
• Kentucky at Mississippi State, 9 ET. The Wildcats are perfect in SEC play while the Bulldogs are fading fast after losing three straight to Georgia, LSU and Auburn. With Alabama’s lineup decimated by suspensions, this is Mississippi State’s last chance to pick up a quality win before the SEC Tournament.
• New Mexico at Colorado State, 10 ET. The Mountain West’s hottest team hits the road to play the Mountain West’s most desperate team. New Mexico is riding a seven-game winning streak into Fort Collins, including back-to-back wins against San Diego State and UNLV. The Rams haven’t won two straight since mid-January and need to hold court against the Lobos before facing San Diego State and UNLV in their next two games.

We take you coast to coast with news from around the college basketball nation.

In case you missed it somehow, Shabazz Napier delivered a stay of execution for UConn when he nailed a deep game-winning 3-pointer in overtime at Villanova, as Troy Machir notes at Ballin Is a Habit. Arguably, Napier got a little premature with his shot instead of waiting another second or two to guarantee his shot would be the last of overtime. But at least he had a better sense of the space-time continuum than his teammate Andre Drummond. As Machir highlights, Drummond decided that a rocket-launched shot from 94 feet away would be a good idea with six seconds to go. Ugh.

Maryland’s athletic director threw down the gauntlet at Georgetown, proclaiming that the Hoyas and Terps should play each other in all sports or not at all, writes USA Today’s Erick Smith. The two Washington, D.C., area teams haven’t met in the regular season in nearly 20 years.

Just a few days after getting ignominiously tossed from a place they used to call home, former NC State players Tom Gugliotta and Chris Corchiani will be honored during the Wolfpack’s game against North Carolina tonight, along with the rest of their 1989 teammates. That squad won NC State’s last regular-season ACC title.

The New York Times’ Ray Glier chronicles the tough choices Alabama coach Anthony Grant has made this season, sacrificing immediate success for sound principles.

Western Kentucky must be pretty impressed with Ray Harper’s plan for the future because the university has decided to ditch the interim tag and make former coach Ken McDonald’s replacement the official Hilltoppers coach, according to an Associated Press report.

Florida coach Billy Donovan delivered some good news to Gator fans Monday when he announced that guard Mike Rosario, who averages just short of eight points per game, should be back in the lineup against Auburn after missing three games with a hip pointer, according to an Associated Press report.

Steve Yanda blogs for the Washington Post that Virginia still might not have sophomore sharpshooter Joe Harris at 100 percent yet. But that’s better than senior center Assane Sene, who might not be back this season from his fractured ankle.

The countdown to Selection Sunday starts — less than a month to go

It’s hard to believe, but Selection Sunday is officially less than a month away — 26 days to be precise.

That means it’s separation time. The best teams throughout the nation need to raise the bar to claim a regular-season conference championship and jockey for NCAA Tournament seeding.

For the vast majority of the 31 conferences that receive automatic bids to the NCAA Tournament, winning a regular-season conference title is about more than bragging rights. In many conference tournament formats, the regular-season winner gets a bye or home court advantage — sometimes both — at some point in the upcoming conference tourneys. Teams like the America East’s Stony Brook, Big Sky’s Weber State, and SWAC’s Mississippi Valley State won’t be getting at-large bids to the Big Dance if they don’t capture a conference championship in the tournaments. So they’ll take any advantage they can get.

For teams that regularly see their names on cable channels’ TV lineup, now is the time to impress the selection committee. Kansas and Duke are making moves now that might pay off in the form of a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Besides playing for seeding, teams from the top conferences are also playing for location. One of the regional locations is St. Louis. Don’t you think Missouri would love to play its Sweet 16 and Elite Eight games there while Kansas gets shipped to Phoenix? That kind of location advantage will be at stake during the next few weeks.

It’s a wonderful time of year, with so much at stake. We’ve started our annual bracketology sessions, joining the myriad experts out there who publish their predictions on a regular basis. Although the early predictions often look nothing like the finished product delivered by the Selection Committee, the exercise is fun and enlightening — every game matters now. A road win against an elite team could be worth a two or three seed jump, while a bad home loss to a conference cellar dweller could move a team slotted as a No. 11 or 12 seed straight out of the tournament.

So tune in, and enjoy the next eight weeks of basketball nirvana.

We take you coast to coast with news from around the college basketball nation.

From the ashes of the Mountain West Conference and Conference USA, a new, yet-to-be-named creature will emerge. The remaining schools from the two conferences will form a new association that will include Air Force, Colorado State, East Carolina, Fresno State, Marshall, Nevada, New Mexico, Rice, Southern Miss, Tulsa, UAB, UNLV, UTEP and Wyoming. For football, Hawaii also will compete in the conference, according to ESPN.com’s Andy Katz.

Florida and Alabama will have some key players but not others when the two square off Tuesday night. Alabama has reinstated Trevor Releford and Andrew Steele after suspending them for Saturday’s loss at LSU, according to the Associated Press. However, a couple of other Crimson Tide players won’t be back yet. And the Gators will play without Will Yeguete (concussion) and Mike Rosario (hip pointer), according to another AP report.

North Carolina coach Roy Williams is unsure whether the Tar Heels will have freshman shooter P.J. Hairston available for the game at Miami Wednesday after missing the Virginia game with a sore foot, writes Robbi Pickeral for ESPN.com’s “College Basketball Nation” blog.

Virginia suffered some damage in that loss in Chapel Hill last weekend, with sharpshooter Joe Harris breaking his left hand. According to the Washington Post’s Steve Yanda, coach Tony Bennett won’t know until game time whether Harris will be ready to play tonight at Clemson.

After a great game against Wisconsin, freshman Andre Hollins will likely return to Minnesota’s starting lineup, coach Tubby Smith told the Associated Press. Hollins started earlier in the season before injuries and a lack of confidence slowed his effectiveness.

Lipscomb has booted the best 3-point shooter in the country, showing senior Jordan Burgason the door after the guard, who shoots 52.6 percent from 3-point range, for breaking university policies, according to an ESPN.com news services report.

From fury to funding charity, a Michigan State bench chair has seen it all recently. Granted, it might not be the precise chair that Iowa coach Fran McCaffery roughed up during the Hawkeyes’ 95-61 beatdown in Lansing, but Iowa put a Michigan State bench chair to good use by auctioning it off for charity, writes the Iowa City Press-Citizen’s Ryan Suchomel.

Although the NCAA finds the Fighting Sioux nickname hostile and abusive, North Dakota might begin using the nickname again for its sports teams if a petition is successful to put the issue to a state vote, according to an Associated Press report.

Baylor is clearly third in the Big 12

At this time of the year, we find out who teams are. The importance of each game in the standings is clearer, teams have injuries, seniors are playing their final games and freshmen have about 20 games under their belt.

Every season, there are some teams that look very good for a while, even good enough in our minds to be Final Four and/or national championship contenders. They have the talent, experience and early on a few good wins. They might not lose a game for a while, even beating some good teams. Then sooner or later, they get tested, and we find that they’re not quite at that level.

Enter this year’s Baylor Bears, 72-57 losers at Missouri on Saturday.

Baylor had a pretty solid non-conference run. Sure, they had the easy ones like Texas Southern and Jackson State, along with South Carolina State, Prairie View A&M, Bethune-Cookman and even Paul Quinn. But they also beat San Diego State, Northwestern (road), BYU (road), Saint Mary’s and West Virginia in Dallas, and Mississippi State in Dallas. They ran out to a 17-0 mark.

The Bears’ first loss came at Kansas. That wasn’t the worst thing that could happen, but it was a convincing loss in Allen Fieldhouse that had to raise a little question: does the Big 12 still belong first to Kansas, not a comparative upstart like Baylor? The Bears couldn’t bounce back with Missouri a few days later, losing a tough one by one in Waco.

Fast forward to this week. Kansas came to Waco and scored another convincing win on Wednesday, and now Missouri took care of them on Saturday. It was a repeat of the earlier matchups.

The Bears have lost four times on the season, and all four have come against the stalwarts of the Big 12 in Kansas and Missouri. Thus we have established that if the Bears are Final Four or national title contenders, they’ve got company in their conference. But what’s more likely is that the Bears are a little short of that level. The pecking order in the Big 12 is crystal clear right now: Missouri and Kansas are at the top, and Baylor leads the next tier.

Perhaps it was best summed up by Baylor forward Anthony Jones: “We just have to hope a lot of stuff goes our way. We’ve got to win out for the rest of conference and hope some games go bad for Missouri and Kansas.” In other words, it’s out of the Bears’ hands at this point.

There is still time for Baylor to correct things from these games. If they meet either or both squads in the Big 12 Tournament, a victory would not be a shocker. But the results are what they are and tell us something right now.

We take you coast to coast with news from around the college basketball nation.

Lipscomb kicked the top three-point shooter in the country out of the school for an undisclosed violation of team rules. Jordan Burgason, a senior guard, was shooting 52.6 percent from long range on the season and led the team in scoring at 16.4 points per game.

The New York Post is reporting that a top official at St. John’s is suspected of being involved in widespread ticket scalping, notably from last season’s game against Duke and the Big East Tournament.

Michigan State won a Big Ten showdown, and on the road no less, to pull into a tie for first with Ohio State.

Syracuse pulled away from Connecticut, which puts the Huskies in a tenuous position as far as the NCAA Tournament goes. The Huskies are 5-7 in Big East play and don’t look like they have a run in them like they did a year ago.

Louisville pulled out a 77-74 road win at West Virginia. That puts the Mountaineers below .500 in Big East play, so they don’t have a lot of room for error down the stretch.

With Kentucky pulling off a big win at Vanderbilt and Tennessee knocking off Florida in Gainesville, the Wildcats are in command with a three-game lead in the SEC.

UNLV pulled out a thriller against San Diego State.

Wichita State went to Omaha and blew out slumping Creighton 89-68.

Arizona got a scare from Utah, but survived in Tucson. A loss to the Utes is about the last thing the Wildcats needed.

The Ivy League race got a lot more interesting as Princeton beat Harvard and Yale mounted a furious rally to win at Columbia and stay a game back. Harvard and Yale meet next Saturday night in Cambridge and could be doing so with first place on the line.

Middle Tennessee now has a clear path to a regular season Sun Belt title after knocking off UALR to go two games up in the loss column.

Mississippi Valley State improved to 12-0 in SWAC play, and with Arkansas-Pine Bluff knocking off second-place Southern, Mississippi Valley State is now three games up in the loss column.

Sunday’s key matchups:

Illinois at Michigan
St. John’s at Georgetown
Northwestern at Purdue
Washington at Oregon State
Stony Brook at Vermont
Fairfield at Loyola (Md.)

Round 233: UNC vs. Duke tips off with more than pride at stake

The first of two regular-season meetings between two of the most hate-filled rivals in American sports goes down tonight when Duke makes the short trip to the Dean Dome to visit North Carolina.

As is usually the case in recent years, this game has significant importance in the standings, with both teams jockeying with Florida State for the top spot in the ACC. North Carolina enters the game at 7-1 in conference action, while Duke slipped to 6-2 after losing to Miami. Duke can ill-afford another loss, especially because the Seminoles and Tar Heels will not meet again this regular season.

Besides the usual hostility generated by one of the most intense rivalries in the game, the 233rd match up between these teams — UNC leads the all-time series 131-101 — is critical for both teams. Duke is facing more than its fair share of critics after a lackluster performance against the Hurricanes. Meanwhile, North Carolina needs to prove it can beat an elite team, sometime the Heels haven’t done in a few months.

For the Blue Devils, coach Mike Krzyzewski will be looking for renewed passion from his team after calling them out for lacking the energy to compete with the Hurricanes in the overtime loss at Cameron Indoor Stadium. Expect his team to rally around his battle cry, especially on the road surrounded by the Enemy in Powder Blue. To win, Duke will need to play smart defense, something the Blue Devils haven’t done consistently this season.

On the other hand, North Carolina seems to be on the rise, especially after a gutsy win in College Park last weekend in which Maryland tried to beat up the Tar Heels. Unlike the game in Tallahassee in which Florida State annihilated UNC, the Tar Heels responded after getting hit in the mouth and clamped down in the second half to erase a nine-point deficit to win by nine. However, the Tar Heels haven’t beaten a team guaranteed to be in the NCAA Tournament since they knocked off Wisconsin in Chapel Hill Nov. 30. North Carolina needs a win at home against the team’s arch rival to validate the argument that this team should be in the conversation for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament.

That adds a lot of pressure to both teams, and that might favor North Carolina. The Tar Heels have a roster full of players who have been through this rivalry at least three times after last season. Duke has struggled with leadership on the court, and the Blue Devils must get someone to step up or else things could ugly for Duke pretty quickly.

Let the battle begin.

We take you coast to coast with news from around the college basketball nation.

Louisville coach Rick Pitino got his wish with Memphis, as the Tigers will be joining the Big East starting in 2013-14, according an ESPN.com news services report. Pitino had lobbied for the Conference USA’s Tigers to join the Big East to help replace the power that will be departing with West Virginia, Syracuse and Pittsburgh in coming years.

Florida coach Billy Donovan tried to preach that Kentucky faced all the pressure entering the Gators/Wildcats clash Tuesday night, with the home team trying to extend a 15-game winning streak and 48-game undefeated streak at Rupp Arena, according to the Associated Press. That psyche-out didn’t seem to work as the Wildcats clobbered Florida 78-58.

If Connecticut can rally around the toughness of coach Jim Calhoun, the Huskies won’t be out of the picture despite a bleak couple of weeks, including a horrid loss Monday night at Louisville. Calhoun told ESPN’s Andy Katz that he doesn’t plan to let spinal stenosis to force him into retirement, and the coach could return to the sidelines sometime this season if the pain in his legs and back subsides.

There’s also health concerns for another coach: College of Charleston’s Bobby Cremins. The 64-year-old Cougar coach took a leave of absence Jan. 27, and he told people that he’s just taking a break to recuperate from a lack of energy, according to a CBS Sports.com wire report.

Alabama’s tournament chances could be in some jeopardy after the team indefinitely suspended junior Tony Mitchell for misconduct, writes TideNation’s Alex Scarborough. The junior forward averages 13.1 ppg and 7.0 rpg in more than 30 minutes per game for the Crimson Tide.

Head-to-head comparisons: TIQ studs vs. prime time stars

If you’re looking at nothing but overall productivity on the court per 40 minutes, a few big names don’t have the same impressive stats when compared to guys who aren’t receiving as much attention but are legit stat stuffers.

As mentioned in the latest TIQ stats for the ACC, Pac-12 and SEC, I’m taking a look at head-to-head comparisons from each conference. Here’s who’s on tap:

• ACC: North Carolina State’s Lorenzo Brown vs. North Carolina’s Harrison Barnes
• Pac-12: Washington’s Tony Wroten vs. Oregon State’s Jared Cunningham
• SEC: Florida’s Patric Young vs. Vanderbilt’s John Jenkins … Continue Reading

Big East dominates SEC-Big East Challenge

We’re still a few weeks shy of the beginning of conference play in the Big East, but this past week gave us some of the best tests these teams will see in the nonconference season with the SEC-Big East Challenge.

These interconference events are great hooks for college basketball fans trying to get out of the malaise of colder weather and bad local football teams. ESPN dreams up match ups that force some teams (cough, cough, Cincinnati) to play at least one decent team before they get into the rough and tumble life of conference play.

This year, the Challenge expanded from its normal eight-team, two-night format to include 24 teams in 12 games over the span of three nights. … Continue Reading

Big Ten rises to the Challenge

The Big Ten has the look and feel of the best conference in the country.

From top to bottom, the Big Ten has the most quality, and those teams were on display Tuesday as the conference grabbed a 4-2 lead in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge.

Among the premier teams, Ohio State thumped Duke 85-63 as the Buckeyes tore through the Blue Devils’ Swiss cheese defense. Four of Ohio State’s five starters scored at least 17 points, led by Jared Sullinger’s 21. As a team, Ohio State shot nearly 60 percent from the field and from 3-point range. When they did miss, they collected the rebounds nearly 30 percent of the time, which is actually off their season average of about 34 percent, according to Ken Pomeroy’s stats. But when you’re already shooting 60 percent, any second chances at all could be devastating for your opponent.

Although the convincing victory is excellent, it’s not altogether shocking. Duke entered a hostile environment in Columbus coming off a tough trip to Maui last week in which the Blue Devils battled tooth and nail three straight days to claim the EA Sports Maui Invitational title. Yes, they had nearly a week off, but Duke looked tired, as several players launched air balls from deep throughout the game. With eight days off until their next game, look for the Blue Devils to rest up and rebound well.

Perhaps the best win of the Big Ten/ACC Challenge last night was Northwestern’s 16-point victory at Georgia Tech. For a team searching for its first NCAA Tournament bid in school history, the Wildcats had to win this one. Georgia Tech does not figure to be competitive for the ACC title this year, but the Thrillerdome remains a tough place to play. Northwestern was on its game, shooting 55 percent from the field, with John Shurna leading the way with 25 points. The Wildcats’ win is impressive because it’s not like the team is totally unfamiliar to the Yellow Jackets. Georgia Tech coach Brian Gregory was an assistant to MIchigan State’s Tom Izzo for several years, including in 2003, Bill Carmody’s first season in Evanston. And it’s not like his style of play has changed much in eight years, according to Pomeroy’s stats.

The Big Ten will look to continue its strong play tonight, highlighted by a huge match up in Chapel Hill between North Carolina and Wisconsin.

Here are some other news and notes from across the college basketball nation.

North Carolina’s Harrison Barnes is expected to play in that clash with the Badgers tonight after spraining his ankle in the Tar Heels’ loss to UNLV last weekend, ESPN reports.

Bernie Fine is out at Syracuse after new and more troublesome allegations of sexual abuse emerged during the past week. However, the Associated Press’ John Kekis writes, Orange coach Jim Boeheim isn’t worried about his own job security, despite vehemently defending Fine when the allegations first appeared, going as far as to call the accusers liars. The investigation continues in this case, so Fine is innocent until proven guilty. But there apparently was enough smoke for Syracuse to find cause to ditch the veteran assistant before a raging fire broke out.

USC forward Dewayne Dedmon, averaging 7.7 ppg and 6.0 rig, will miss about a month because of a stress injury in his right foot, the Associated Press reports. The Trojans have been struggling already this season with one of their big men in the lineup. This certainly won’t help the cause.

Eamonn Brennan notes for ESPN’s College Basketball Nation blog that Florida coach Billy Donovan picked up win No. 400 in his career when the Gators dismantled Stetson 96-70. At age 45, Donovan is one of the few coaches in the game who have the early success that could put him in position to challenge Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski’s record for Division I wins — whenever Coach K calls it a career.

Bracket Breakdown: Critical Questions for the Elite Eight

Let’s dive right into today’s Elite Eight match ups between Florida and Butler, followed by Connecticut and Arizona.

(8) Butler 74 (2) Florida 71 OT

In each of the past two NCAA Tournaments that Florida played Butler, the Gators reached the national title game, winning it in 2007 and losing to Michigan State in 2000. These two teams are different from their recent counterparts, and the winner will be one step away from the championship game. … Continue Reading

Bracket Breakdown: How the SEC Will Fare

The biggest difference between this season and last season in the SEC is the arrival of coach John Calipari at Kentucky. Coach Cal has the Wildcats positioned among the elite teams in the country thanks to one of the best recruiting classes in the past decade. Kentucky will now roll the dice with a bunch of freshmen who have no postseason experience but all the talent needed to make a run.

Besides the Wildcats, the three other tournament teams look vulnerable to first-round knockouts. Here is a preview of the SEC’s NCAA Tournament representatives.

Kentucky Wildcats (Overall: 32-2, SEC: 14-2)

No. 1 seed, East Region

When John Calipari bolted from Memphis to Lexington after last season, Kentucky faithful knew they had a proven winner who could lead the Wildcats back to the basketball’s elite. But even the most optimistic fans must be surprised by the immediate success Calipari has enjoyed with one of the youngest but most talented teams in the country. Super-frosh John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins delivered the Wildcats a No. 1 seed in the East Region and have the team poised to make its deepest tournament run since 2005.

However, the Wildcats will need its freshmen to play like veterans, even though no one on this team has played in an NCAA Tournament game. Their lack of big-game experience would seem to bode poorly for the Wildcats’ Final Four chances. However, the team’s balanced offense and defense should easily carry Kentucky to the Sweet 16. Getting any further will be a major challenge, though.

Kentucky’s weaknesses are three-point shooting, occasional sloppiness on offense and downright bad free throw shooting. Either No. 4-seed Wisconsin or No. 5-seed Temple has the defensive fortitude necessary to slow down the Wildcat’s uber-athletic lineup. They also play a painfully slow pace, which will encourage Wall to try to force plays. Wisconsin and Temple are great at getting back on defense, so the Wildcats won’t have many opportunities in transition. And the Owls and Badgers are among the top teams in defensive field goal percentage. That spells trouble for Kentucky.

Look for Wall and company to make some noise with spectacular plays throughout three games before falling to a more veteran and controlled Wisconsin squad.

Vanderbilt Commodores (Overall: 24-8, SEC: 12-4)

No. 4 seed, West Region

Vanderbilt has had another strong season, entering the NCAA Tournament with 24 wins. After seemingly being on the hot seat each year, coach Kevin Stallings has established the Commodores, the No. 4 seed in the West Region, as a perennial SEC contender. That’s impressive in a conference that contains the likes of Kentucky, Florida and LSU.

This season, the Commodores have a squad that can beat great teams or lose to mediocre ones. Vanderbilt needs to be ready to play in San Jose against No. 13-seed Murray State, which has a balanced, experienced lineup. Unlike past seasons, Vanderbilt does not get a high percentage of its points from three-point territory, preferring to work the offense through Aussie big man A.J. Ogilvy. However, the Racers are No. 4 in the nation in field goal percentage inside the arc. If Vanderbilt cannot get good looks inside the three-point line, the Commodores will struggle.

Six of Vanderbilt’s wins this seasons were decided by five points or less. Although it’s good that the Commodores know how to win close games, they might have benefited from a statistical anomaly. Vanderbilt’s opponents shoot an absolutely putrid 63.5 percent from the free throw line. How many points did those opponents leave at the line? Would Vanderbilt even be in the tournament if they had lost four of those six games and had 12 losses? The deciding factor in a major first-round upset will be the Racers’ 70.3 percent shooting from the line, including the performances of three players who log at least 50 percent of the team’s minutes and shoot at least 77 percent from the line.

Tennessee Volunteers (Overall: 25-8, SEC: 11-5)

No. 6 seed, Midwest Region

When we last saw Tennessee, the Volunteers were getting stomped by Kentucky, 74-45, in the SEC Tournament. Will that loss portend a short NCAA Tournament trip, or will coach Bruce Pearl rally the troops, starting against No. 11-seed San Diego State? Tennessee has the defense necessary to bounce back but the offensive inconsistency to lose ugly again.

Tennessee’s defense ranks No. 8 in defense efficiency, mostly on the strength of great three-point defense. Opponents shoot only 29.3 percent from long range. However, that might not matter against San Diego State, which focuses more on the inside game than perimeter. Neither team looks strong, and the Volunteers should find a way to win before losing to No. 3-seed Georgetown in the second round.

Florida Gators (Overall: 21-12, SEC: 9-7)

No. 10 seed, West Region

Several spurned teams, now in the NIT, probably take issues with Florida’s inclusion in the NCAA Tournament. The Gators will try to justify their bid against No. 7-seed BYU, but they won’t have much success. The Cougars have offensive and defensive advantages, while the Gators don’t excel at anything. They are an all-around solid club, as evidenced by wins against Tennessee and Michigan State. But Florida lacks consistency and generally loses to better teams. Look for that trend to continue as the weakest SEC team in the tournament bows out without much fanfare.

Florida: Lucas Picks Texas

Former Florida sophomore guard Jai Lucas announced that he will transfer to Texas. If Lucas enrolls before the second semester starts, he would be eligible to play after the first semester of next season. He said Texas was his favorite school, and coach Rick Barnes was a major factor in his decision to attend Texas. Florida coach Billy Donovan said in November, when Lucas decided to leave the school, that Lucas wanted to play point guard, a position occupied by sophomore Nick Calathes.