The field is set, the snubs have been suffered, and the NCAA tournament finally kicks off Thursday night after a year in hiatus. In this space we track the fortunes of the teams who have never made the Sweet Sixteen since the field was expanded to 64 back in 1985, those who have Never Been Kissed (NBK).

This year we follow thirteen such hopefuls into the NCAAs and in pursuit of second weekend glory and fame. As they have all season, Creighton and Colorado top our list, each a 5-seed with a better than 1 in 3 shot of making the Sweet Sixteen. Creighton has to get past fellow NBKer #12 UCSB then either #4 Virigina or #13 Ohio in order to survive. Colorado faces #12 Georgetown then the winner of #4 Florida St. and #13 UNCG. Those are rough pods to my eye, but if forced I would pick Colorado as the one to emerge.

The next tier of NBK hopefuls are Utah St., Rutgers, and St. Bonaventure down in that 7-11 seed soup. With the 1s and 2s looking particularly strong this year and the 3s vulnerable, KenPom has Utah St., the worst seed of the three, with the best odds by a hair. Drake will also move up into that 14-17% range should they win their First Four game tonight against Wichita St. That is slightly better than a coin toss (57%) so a longer road for the Bulldogs than most.

Of those with a less than 1 in 10 shot of making the Sweet Sixteen and graduating from this list forever, aforementioned UCSB holds out the most hope. Creighton relies pretty heavily on three point shooting, and in an emptier-than-usual Dome setting this could be problematic. If it’s close, the Bluejays are a terrible Free Throw shooting team (#329 in the country per KenPom) and vulnerable to a comeback in the endgame. UCSB is strong from the line at #32. With a pair of dynamic veteran point guards in Creighton’s Marcus Zegarowski and the Gauchos’ JaQuori McLauglin, this should be a fun one to watch.

Notes

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and NCAA.org. For “KenPom Sweet Sixteen Odds” Ken Pomeroy’s NCAA tourney forecasts are used until the team advances past the first round, in which case the heavy-bordered cell contains the KenPom odds ($) of winning the second round game itself.