Just as basketball fans have come to accept Selection Sunday as tradition, the same can be said of the criticism and snubs that follow. Each year, the Selection Committee questioned about whether or not it has made the correct selections.
Exactly 68 teams have been invited to “The Big Dance” and, for the most part, there is not a clear-cut snub for the media to protest over. Programs such as Alabama, TCU and Indiana all could have made a case for a tournament bid of its own, but, before the nation falls prey to immediacy-bias, a deeper look is needed.
Alabama (18-15 and 8-10 in the SEC) simply could not find the energy that it started the season with later on. Despite early wins over Kentucky and Murray State, the Crimson Tide failed to muster up a single victory over LSU, Auburn or Tennessee. Ending the year with seven losses in its final ten games was not the stretch that head coach Avery Johnson would have hoped for, either. It likely kept his squad on the outside looking in.
Another team that lost seven of their last ten were the TCU Horned Frogs, who finished at 20-13, including 7-11 in the Big 12. Tied for the third-worst record in conference, the committee seemingly identified both as clear-indicators of its decision. Kansas State was also able to bounce the Horned Frogs in the second round of the Big 12 Tournament. Key losses to Lipscomb, Texas Tech, Oklahoma State and West Virginia were the final nail in the coffin for TCU.
Archie Miller had a tough time correcting the roller coaster at Indiana, which was 17-15 and 8-12 in the Big Ten this season. Three wins in the top-30 and a clean-sweep over Michigan State certainly sounds like enough to get an invitation to the tournament. However, losses to Rutgers, Nebraska and Northwestern all came during a mid-season slump for the Hoosiers. That stretch of games saw Miller’s team losing 12 of 13 and, essentially, raising a red-flag to the committee.
A dark-horse that didn’t make the list of the First Four is North Carolina State. The Wolfpack, 22-11 and 9-9 ACC, look as deserving as any team just by their record. Going .500 in the ACC is not a walk in the park, and 11 losses is less than some others that punched their ticket. However, once you dive a bit deeper, you can easily see why they will not be playing any more serious basketball this season. N.C. State went 1-8 against teams that would be tournament-bound and flat-out lost games that it should not have. With blemishes on their record, from Wake Forest and Georgia Tech, the Wolfpack wound up beating themselves.
All that can be agreed on is that there is never going to be a tournament that the committee “got right.” Instead, everyone will sit back and argue over snubs, poor rankings and just about anything that can be debated. After all, there’s a reason it’s called March Madness.
Anthony Talarico can be reached at anthony.talarico@student.shu.edu or on Twitter @ant_tal.
