Can anyone tell me why they assign play-in games for 16 seeds and 11 or 12 seeds?

Like, shouldnt they all be 16 seeds?

Anyone notice that Oregon and UC Irvine are 12 and 13 seeds, but get to play in San Jose vs teams from the other side of the country?
That's odd.

UW 9 seed vs 8 Utah St on Friday in Columbus Ohio

concordtom said:

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Can anyone tell me why they assign play-in games for 16 seeds and 11 or 12 seeds?

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This was the agreement to expand the field to 68. The first time they expanded (to 66) only the 16 seeds had play-in games. When they added two more, the deal (probably insisted upon by the smaller conferences) was to make the lowest four conference champions (16 seeds) AND the lowest four at-large teams (usually 11 or 12 seeds) do play-in games.

Well, at least we are not in the play in game this year.

oskidunker, are you getting funnier, or am I getting crazier? Maybe both?

I saw asu was in the play in game snd had bad memories of South Florida.

oskidunker said:

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I saw asu was in the play in game and had bad memories of South Florida.

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https://www.nbcsports.com/bayarea/ncaa/cals-season-comes-end-ugly-loss-south-florida?amp

Oregon has easiest road to sweet sixteen

12/5 game has the most upsets and they play a meh Wisconsin team, then winner of k state/ Long Beach

UW in the 8/9 game and ASU in the play in

Yes?

concordtom said:

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Anyone notice that Oregon and UC Irvine are 12 and 13 seeds, but get to play in San Jose vs teams from the other side of the country?
That's odd.

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Cal was placed in San Jose as a #12 seed several years ago, IIRC. Bears beat #5 seed UNLV in the first round and lost to #4 Syracuse in the second round.

BearSD said:

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concordtom said:

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Anyone notice that Oregon and UC Irvine are 12 and 13 seeds, but get to play in San Jose vs teams from the other side of the country?
That's odd.

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Cal was placed in San Jose as a #12 seed several years ago, IIRC. Bears beat #5 seed UNLV in the first round and lost to #4 Syracuse in the second round.

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I believe the committee said they had to underseed us a little in that bracket. I suspect the favorable region was a way to make up for that.

sycasey said:

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BearSD said:

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concordtom said:

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Anyone notice that Oregon and UC Irvine are 12 and 13 seeds, but get to play in San Jose vs teams from the other side of the country?
That's odd.

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Cal was placed in San Jose as a #12 seed several years ago, IIRC. Bears beat #5 seed UNLV in the first round and lost to #4 Syracuse in the second round.

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I believe the committee said they had to underseed us a little in that bracket. I suspect the favorable region was a way to make up for that.

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That makes sense. Also, UNLV did not deserve anything close to a 5-seed that year. It was essentially an 8 vs 9 game rather than a 5 vs 12 game.

BearSD said:

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sycasey said:

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BearSD said:

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concordtom said:

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Anyone notice that Oregon and UC Irvine are 12 and 13 seeds, but get to play in San Jose vs teams from the other side of the country?
That's odd.

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Cal was placed in San Jose as a #12 seed several years ago, IIRC. Bears beat #5 seed UNLV in the first round and lost to #4 Syracuse in the second round.

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I believe the committee said they had to underseed us a little in that bracket. I suspect the favorable region was a way to make up for that.

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That makes sense. Also, UNLV did not deserve anything close to a 5-seed that year. It was essentially an 8 vs 9 game rather than a 5 vs 12 game.

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Yeah, that was the other thing, a very weak 5 seed. The Mountain West teams were weirdly overseesed that year and the Pac-12 underseeded. Naturally the MWC teams got bounced and the P12 teams advanced past their normal seed lines.

One interesting thing to see was that the NCAA touted its new NET rating system over the old RPI, but if you look at the bubble selections, they seem to hew more closely to RPI than NET. For example, NC State was much higher in NET than St. John's, but St. John's was higher in RPI. St. John's got in, NC State did not.

NET: https://www.ncaa.com/rankings/basketball-men/d1/ncaa-mens-basketball-net-rankings

RPI: https://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/rankings/nitty-gritty-report