The field is set! Joey Brackets once again only missed one (congratulations Nevada, our condolences Rutgers)! And this year’s bracket contains a whopping 25 schools that have never made it to the Sweet Sixteen in the years since the field was first expanded to 64 teams back in 1985. These teams are the Never Been Kissed (NBK), and in this post we rank them from most- to least-likely to make it to the second weekend.
Last year all of our predictions about who would emerge were wrong – we liked San Francisco, Vermont, Colgate, Boise St., and Texas Southern, but only longshot Saint Peter’s (2.0% chance) made it to the promised land. Undaunted by our failed past, we will again pick one from the 20s, one from the 10s, and a flyer from the single-digits.
We like TCU this year to take care of business against aforementioned Nevada, then swing the upset over Gonzaga in round two. The Horned Frogs are NBK veterans, and made it through a very tough Big XII slate. The Zags had Saint Mary’s to contend with, and ultimately prevailed in the Big West final, but they have been on mothballs now for more than a week. It looks like they will be without beloved big man Eddie Lampkin Jr. for the tournament, but this year we foresee the rise in small ball as the prevailing trend. As Clark Kellogg might say, the “Froghorns” move on.
To that end, we are also picking N.C. State at 10.9% with their three-guard combo of Terquavion Smith, Jarkel Joiner, and Casey Morsell frustrating a bigger Creighton squad and playing Baylor’s combo of Keyonte George, Adam Flagler, and LJ Cryer to a stalemate. Wolfpack to the second week.
Kennesaw St. is our longshot pick this year (2.7%). The Owls don’t have a player over 6’8″ but they can shoot it from deep (37% on threes, #33 per KenPom). Colgate is the best three-point shooting team in the country this year, up over 40%, but we do not like their matchups with Texas and Texas A&M. Thus the pick of the Owls.
Data courtesy Kenpom.com
