FRIDAY – Roughly half the conference tournaments are underway, and the other half of the country finishes out the regular season this weekend, and we check back in with the schools looking to make the Sweet Sixteen for the first time since the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament first expanded to 64. Here are the biggest games of the weekend for this pack of puckered peppers:

Utah St hosts New Mexico on Saturday in a game the Aggies can probably afford to lose and the Lobos probably cannot. Everyone in the Mountain West Conference office will be pulling for New Mexico. As it stands now, Joey Brackets has them both IN.

Staying in the Mountain West — official conference sponsor of the NBK — Boise St visits Colorado St as they sit tied for fifth with identical 11-5 conference records. Both are off the bubble at the moment so need all the positioning they can get heading into the MWC Tourney. CSU has won seven straight; Boise St four in a row.

As I sit here and type, #1 Belmont falls in the Arch Madness quarterfinal, upset 100-81 by #9 Drake. The Bruins look unlikely to grab an at-large bid, and March Madness will be denied the nation’s #1 Effective Field Goal % Offense per KenPom. We’ll switch horses and pull for Illinois St to grab the MVC auto-bid.

Red hot TCU hosts white-hot Cincinnati to close out the Big XII schedule. SMU needs to hold serve at home vs Florida St to avoid finishing with a losing record in the ACC.

The top two in Conference USA square off when Liberty – who has already clinched the regular season title – hosts Sam Houston St.

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and ESPN Bracketology and ESPN Bubble Watch

The major conferences are in the last week of their regular seasons, while most of the other leagues have already wrapped their regular seasons and are prepping for the conference tournament. As KenPom sends out his Log5 predictions for conference tournament victory odds this week, we’ll update our NBK – Never Been Kissed – standings as often as time allows.

Meanwhile, the biggest movers in the past couple of weeks have been:

Hofstra – Speedy Claxton’s Pride have won 7 of 8 to move into third-place in the CAA with the highest KenPom rating in the league. The CAA tournament should be a good three-way battle among Hofstra, UNC Wilmington, and Charleston.

St Thomas – the Tommies (not kidding) closed hard to grab the #2 seed in the Summit League tournament. They split with conference champ North Dakota State, losing a close one on the road and winning decisively at home more recently.

What in the Sam Houston St is happening in Conference USA? The Bearkats – led by Po’Boigh King – go into the final week of the regular season winning 12 of 13 and a date looms with conference leader Liberty to close it out.

On the downside, Illinois St lost to fellow MVC contenders Illinois Chicago and Bradley down the stretch, and have not won three straight since New Year’s Day. They are in a jumbled group that head to Arch Madness in the second tier below leaders Belmont.

McNeese keeps winning — they finished 19-3 in the Southland — but a few squeakers down the stretch saw them dip in the KenPom ratings even without a loss. The Southland tournament seems almost certain to be a showdown between the Cowboys and Stephen F. Austin.

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and ESPN Bracketology and ESPN Bubble Watch

With SLU 24-1 and inching closer to Lock status — the latest ESPN Bubble Watch says they are already there, but we are more cautious at NBK HQ — let’s take our First Look this year at the programs who have not made the second weekend of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament since it first expanded to 64 schools in 1985; in all these Sweet Sixteens they’ve Never Been Kissed.

Nebraska, Saint Louis & Utah State are all in power positions with decent amounts of cushion. Locks? We’ll see. SMU returns to the ranks of the NBK after a couple of years away. Santa Clara got waxed by Gonzaga last night but remain in contention for an at-large bid.

As usual the Mountain West conference is the NBKest, with five schools making our rankings. New Mexico & TCU embody the spirit of the NBK with their “First Four Out” and “Work to do” statuses. And farther down the list, Liberty lead the CUSA and retain the faintest “Long shot” hope of not even needing the conference auto-bid to get in.

ESPN Bubble Watch is the next layer deeper than ESPN Bracketology., where teams beyond Joey Brackets purview are still jockeying all the way through to Selection Sunday. We’ll see how many of the Long shots can withstand losing their conference tournament and still get an at-large.

Data courtesy Kenpom.com

With longtime captain Kevin De Bruyne on the back nine of his career, mildly exiled from world beaters Manchester City to Serie A champions Napoli, the All Ginger XI seeks a new arm to place the captain’s band for the first time in nearly a decade. We are running a 4-3-3 and need strong leadership from the backline, and with only one member of the starting unit serving as captain for both club and country, the choice is obvious: Glódís Perla Viggósdóttir is the newest captain of the All Ginger XI. Lead us!

GK – Jordan Pickford – England (#1) & Everton (#1)
D – Glódís Perla Viggósdóttir (c) – Iceland (#4) & Bayern Munich (#4)
D – Molly Bartrip – Tottenham (#5)
D – Stine Ballisager Pedersen – Denmark (#3) & Bayern Munich (#3)
D – Tim Ream – USA (#13) & Charlotte (#3)
MF – Kim Little – Arsenal (#10)
MF – Hal Hershfelt – Washington Spirit (#17)
MF – James McClean – Wrexham (#7)
F – Sjoeke Nüsken – Germany (#15) & Chelsea (#6)
F – Frenkie De Jong – Netherlands (#21) & Barcelona (#21)
F – Josh Sargent – USA (#24) & Norwich City (#9)

Manager – Ronald Koeman – Netherlands men
Announcer – Mike Watts
Podcaster – Sam Mewis

Before the first round we did a WAB-style Draft Preview, and here’s the order our picks were selected:

1. Cooper Flagg – Duke – Selected #1 by Dallas
2. Dylan Harper – Rutgers – Selected #2 by San Antonio
3. Collin Murray-Boyles – South Carolina – Selected #9 by Toronto
4. Jeremiah Frears – Oklahoma – Selected #7 by New Orleans
5. Tre Johnson – Texas – Selected #6 by Washington
6. Derik Queen – Maryland – Selected #13 by New Orleans, who traded up to get him
7. Ace Bailey – Rutgers – Selected #5 by Utah

We’ll see how these picks pan out.

For Round Two, we are not attempting to do a projection. Instead, as the picks are announced we will generate and publish our favored dot-and-line plots with Game Scores per 40. D1 college players only. See the full list below.

31 – Rasheer Fleming – Saint Joseph’s – selected by Minnesota

32 – Noah Penda – France – selected by Orlando

33 – Sion James – Duke – selected by Charlotte

34 – Ryan Kalkbrenner – Creighton – selected by Charlotte

35 – Johni Broome – Auburn – selected by Philadelphia

36 – Adou Thieru – Arkansas – selected by Brooklyn

37 – Chaz Lanier – Tennessee – selected by Detroit

38 – Kameron Jones – Marquette – selected by San Antonio

39 – Alijah Martin – Florida – selected by Toronto

40 – Micah Peavy – Georgetown – selected by Washington

41 – Koby Brea – Kentucky – selected by Golden State

42 – Maxime Raynaud – Stanford – selected by Sacramento

43 – Jamir Watkins – Florida State – selected by Utah

44 – Brooks Barnhizer – Northwestern – selected by Oklahoma City

45 – Rocco Zikarsky – Australia – selected by Chicago

46 – Amari Williams – Kentucky – selected by Orlando

47 – Bogoljub Marković – Serbia – selected by Milwaukee

48 – Javon Small – West Virginia – selected by Memphis

49 – Tyrese Proctor – Duke – selected by Cleveland

50 – Kobe Sanders – Nevada – selected by New York

51 – Mohamed Diawara – France – selected by LA Clippers
52 – Alex Toohey – Australia – selected by Phoenix

53 – John Tonje – Wisconsin – selected by Utah

54 – Taelon Peter – Liberty – selected by Indiana

55 – Lachlan Olbrich – Australia – selected by LA Lakers

56 – Will Richard – Florida – selected by Memphis

57 – Max Shulga – VCU – selected by Orlando

58 – Saliou Niang – Italy – selected by Cleveland

59 – Jahmai Mashack – Tennessee – selected by Houston

Data courtesy Basketball Reference
Game Score metric created by John Hollinger detailed here
Plot format by Aaron Baggett
Inspiration from Ken Pomeroy
Inspiration from Rock M Nation

Team colors courtesy:
Benjamin S. Baumer and Gregory J. Matthews (2020). teamcolors: Color Palettes for Pro Sports Teams. R package version 0.0.4

This is our semi-occasional tradition of taking a What’s a Billiken look at the draft prospects for this year’s NBA draft. The 2025 edition is a WAB-friendly one, with NCAA Division I stars expected in most of the top picks, and potentially filling the entire lottery for the first time since…checks ChatGPT…2000. Last year the top two picks — and four of the first six — were not from D1. And as much as we love all these avenues to the pros and salute Zaccharie Richaser and Ron Holland and the like, we don’t have any data for those players thus can’t compare them in the WAB way we prefer – in the context of their college team using Game Score Per 40 Minutes.

We are not looking at every player — and we are not watching any tape — in preparation for these rankings. We have seen some of these players play, so the Eye Test is certain to inform and lightly skew despite our best efforts. These rankings are not intended to be predictive of who goes where. We are listing them in the order of expected career success, in other words who we like best. Behold! The WAB Draft Rankings for 2025. Enjoy the draft.

1 – Cooper Flagg – Duke

2 – Dylan Harper – Rutgers

3 – Collin Murray-Boyles – South Carolina

4 – Jeremiah Frears – Oklahoma

5 – Tre Johnson – Texas

6 – Derik Queen – Maryland

7 – Ace Bailey – Rutgers

<See Dylan Harper chart above>
I just learned that Ace’s given name is “Airious”. That is a cool name. Ace is a cooler name. Well done, Ace.

Also considered:

Kon Knueppel & Khaman Maluach – Duke – So difficult to choose who will be better that we ended up dropping both. If we were going to bet on it, we’d say Knueppel has a better rookie year and in five years time Maluach ends up ahead.

VJ Edgecombe – Baylor – Omier was decidedly better, and if VJ is supposed to make his teammates better, by this chart he didn’t

Carter Bryant – Arizona – Not understanding this one at all. Caleb Love and many many other teammates were way way better. Maybe he’s so selfless it’s completely unmeasurable? The anti-VJ? The JV?

Jase Richardson – Michigan State – good season and good player but not enough separation from the Adreian Payne and Gary Harris tier to project success

Kasparas Jakucionis – Illinois – significant jump from him up to Terrence Shannon

Cedric Coward – Washington State – smallest sample size since Michael Porter Jr

Liam McNeeley – Connecticut – miles away from Donovan Clingan, Kemba Walker, and even Cam Spencer

Congrats to the winners, condolences to the non-winners, and apologies for the tempo bias.

For fun, see how many guys who just played in the NBA Finals you can spot in these charts. For even more fun, see how many guys appear on multiple of these charts.

Data courtesy Basketball Reference
Game Score metric created by John Hollinger detailed here
Plot format by Aaron Baggett
Inspiration from Ken Pomeroy
Inspiration from Rock M Nation

Team colors courtesy:
Benjamin S. Baumer and Gregory J. Matthews (2020). teamcolors: Color Palettes for Pro Sports Teams. R package version 0.0.4

If Wooden Award winner and soon to be #1 pick in the NBA Draft Cooper Flagg is as competitive as people say, he is never ever going to forget how his Duke team lost to Houston in their epic Final Four battle Saturday night.

Houston (51%) vs Florida – 7:50 PM CDT on CBS

No time for a comprehensive write-up today — work — so let’s talk for a minute about depth. Teams with lots of veterans and/or lots of talented players can bring in substitutes and get some production off of their bench. Teams like Duke & Houston would both be considered relatively deep. But a very good defense will severely limit that depth, exploiting the inadequacy of the replacements and/or convincing the coach through their own Eye Test results to cut short their minutes and rely more on the starters.

The chart below illustrates how this phenomenon played out in Houston-Duke. Generally solid substitutes Mylik Wilson & Terrance Arceneaux — who usually perform right around average for a Houston Cougar — were rendered entirely unproductive by the Blue Devils defense. Emanuel Sharp is simply a rock of consistency so he did what he was going to do anyway. And LJ Cryer broke out for another great game — his third of this tournament. He and the defense carried them to the comeback win.

We don’t have the Duke chart, but it tells a similar story in reverse: Houston severely limited contributions beyond Cooper Flagg, and coach Jon Scheyer could not get anything out of big men tandem Khaman Maluach & Patrick Ngongba. What appeared to be a pretty deep team was pruned down to Flagg, Kon Kneuppel and a bit of Maliq Brown by the swarming Houston defense.

Florida also seems like a deep team, with a higher quality of depth. Their top seven contribute at a higher level than a typical Gator squad — with Tempo Bias certainly contributing. Florida particularly benefits from rotating four productive bigs – starters 6’11” Alex Condon & 6’10” Rueben Chinyelu backed by subs 6’9″ Thomas Haugh & 7’1″ Micah Handlogten. Will Houston be able to trim all these trees and force Florida to ask more of Denzel Aberdeen?

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and Basketball Reference
Game Score metric created by John Hollinger detailed here
Plot format by Aaron Baggett
Inspiration from Ken Pomeroy
Inspiration from Rock M Nation

Team colors courtesy:
Benjamin S. Baumer and Gregory J. Matthews (2020). teamcolors: Color Palettes for Pro Sports Teams. R package version 0.0.4

The Women’s final on Friday night was anticlimatic, with South Carolina dominating Texas, and UConn dismantling UCLA. What lies ahead for the men? Well all four #1 seeds made the Final Four for only the second time in history, and the last time produced an utterly tragic result (kansas winning),, so we are prepared for the worst.

Florida (52%) vs Auburn – 5:09 PM CDT on CBS

With 3:14 remaining in their Elite Eight game, star forward JT Toppin of Texas Tech made a layup to put the Red Raiders up 75-66. and Florida’s dream season teetered. Over the next two minutes, Walter Clayton Jr assisted on two Thomas Haugh threes then made two threes of his own, one a ridiculous dribble out step back fadeaway. Florida made their free throws down the stretch and punched their ticket to San Antonio.

Clayton Jr is the Gators best player and currently #3 in KenPom Player of the Year. He’s expected to carry Florida. Haugh is the sixth-man who has far exceeded his normal output in the tournament, in particular in the Elite Eight. Alijah Martin is the steady veteran who has been there before (Florida Atlantic 2023). Martin did not play in the Gators’ 90-81 regular season win over SEC foe Auburn — Aberdeen started in his place — so Clayton and Haugh carried the load in that one as well.

After Michigan St lost to Auburn in the Elite Eight, Spartans coach Tom Izzo said in his interview he felt like they did a good job containing everything that Auburn can do….except Johni Broome was unstoppable. The chart below backs that up — Broome’s dominant performance carried all the other Tigers suffering through below-average games. Auburn got by the first three rounds with Broome not at his best, then he took over in round four.

Duke (57%) vs Houston – 7:49 PM CDT on CBS

Cooper Flagg is the newly-minted Wooden Award winner and will be the #1 pick in the NBA Draft in June. He was not very good in the Elite Eight against Alabama — 16 points, 9 rebounds but just 6-16 from the field with 4 turnovers — and it just didn’t matter. Last year we noted how UConn had all five of their starters who performed above the Kemba Walker / Shabazz Napier level. This year’s Duke team has three starters above the Jayson Tatum / Brandon Ingram level, and with Flagg up among fellow number one picks Kyrie Irving and Marvin Bagley III, the talent level of the Blue Devils is impressive and might be championship-level.

So how did this 35-3 juggernaut ever lose? Kentucky held them to 16% three-point shooting; Kansas limited their offensive boards and turned them over 16 times; Clemson somehow pounded it inside and controlled the glass on both ends.

Houston has been our bracket pick three years running, and the Cougars finally rewarded our loyalty with a Final Four run. Houston’s #1 defense goes up against Duke’s #1 offense. Houston has tons of experience and loads of Minutes Continuity (#7 per KenPom). Duke’s team just met one another, but they are huge and young and talented. Somehow 6’8″ J’Wan Roberts and 6’8″ Joseph Tugler have to battle to a draw the Duke giants 7’2″ Khaman Maluach and 6’11” Patrick Ngongba.

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and Basketball Reference
Game Score metric created by John Hollinger detailed here
Plot format by Aaron Baggett
Inspiration from Ken Pomeroy
Inspiration from Rock M Nation

Team colors courtesy:
Benjamin S. Baumer and Gregory J. Matthews (2020). teamcolors: Color Palettes for Pro Sports Teams. R package version 0.0.4

Second Round Sunday brought two defeats to the Never Been Kissed (NBK), and closed the book on the teams we have been tracking in this space. Fitting in a year dominated by the big conferences, in a tournament were all four #1 seeds would advance out of their regionals for only the second time ever, that we would see no teams advance to their first Sweet Sixteen since 1985.

Colorado St and Maryland played one of the more entertaining and exciting games of this tournament in the second round. The Rams jumped out to an early lead 24-12 after ten minutes of action, with the Terps steadying things a bit to go into halftime down just 37-30. In a nip-and-tuck second half, Colorado St went into a 1 for 8 shooting funk and were staring at elimination after Maryland’s Julian Reese (brother of Angel) hit two free throws with 22 seconds left to give the Terps a two-point lead. CSU’s Jalen Lake drained a three-pointer with six seconds left, giving the Rams the lead and giving us hope of a 2025 NBK Graduate. Maryland got the ball to midcourt, called a timeout, and gave it to freshman sensation Derik Queen to make the winning floating banker as time expired. The first buzzer beater of the tournament sent Maryland to the next round and Colorado St packing.

New Mexico versus Michigan St mirrored CSU-MD only so far as the underdog got off to a fast start. Michigan St played big with seven blocks and control of the boards and got the Lobos’ big man Nelly Junior Joseph in foul trouble. This game was a bit of a throwback as New Mexico was only 4 for 13 from three point range, and Michgan St only 4 for 15. (In the very next round, Alabama would set all sorts of records going 25 for 51 from three to trounce BYU).

Three of the four schools above were in the news immediately following these elimination games as the Coaching Carousel started to turn in earnest. Colorado St coach Niko Medved took the Minnesota job, formerly held by New Mexico coach Richard Pitino, who left to take the Xavier job. CSU filled their spot by promoting longtime Medved assistant, kU killer, and Norther Iowa legend Ali Farokhmanesh to the top spot. UNM looks to be turning to UC San Diego coach Eric Olen, keeping him within the NBK.

Maryland coach Kevin Willard left to take the Villanova job, and Buzz Williams departed Texas A&M to take over at Maryland — these are not NBK schools but we thought it was an interesting shuffle nonetheless.

Drake coach Ben McCollum departed for Iowa, and looks to be taking point guard and MVC Larry Bird Player of the Year Bennett Stirtz with him. The Bulldogs tapped South Dakota State coach Eric Henderson to fill in. Bryant coach Phil Martelli Jr upgraded to VCU after Ryan Odom left that job for Virginia.

Lastly, Saint Francis PA ended their run in the NBK by declaring their intention to drop down to Division II for basketball starting next year.

Here are the final NBK rankings for 2025 – we will see you again next year.

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and Basketball Reference
Inspiration from Rock M Nation and Bill Connelly

Team colors courtesy:
Benjamin S. Baumer and Gregory J. Matthews (2020). teamcolors: Color Palettes for Pro Sports Teams. R package version 0.0.4

McNeese lost to Purdue 76-62, a score that belies how dominant the Boilermakers were through the majority of this game. Purdue jumped out to a 20-8 lead and were mostly up more than twenty points before the Cowboys desperation shots started falling too too late. Sincere Parker tried to supply the spark off the bench, a la Brandon Murray in round one, but Parker’s 17 points were nowhere near enough to keep this one from getting out of hand. McNeese concludes the fruitful Will Wade era with two straight NCAA appearances and perhaps establish themselves as a stair-step program to attract the next up-and-coming or recently-disgraced coach with Wade leaving tracks for NC State. Trey Kaufman-Renn was absolutely unstoppable for Purdue down low: 22 points and 15 rebounds. The (4) Boilermakers face (1) Houston next.

Drake vs Texas Tech was more competitive. The Bulldogs forced some early missed shots and were tied 18-18 after ten minutes when the Red Raiders ripped off a 13-2 run to forge a 37-30 halftime lead. Drake never got within five points of TT in the second half and ultimately fell 77-64. The inside game of Texas Tech allowed them to shoot 2-14 from three and still win comfortably, as 6’9″ JT Toppin was his usual self — 25 points, 12 rebounds — and 6’6″ Darrion Williams was his best self with 28 points, 6 rebounds & 5 assists. Drake point guard Bennett Stirtz apparently has a year of eligibility left — we’ll see if he runs it back or looks to upgrade his stock in the portal. The (3) Red Raiders will go on to battle (7) Arkansas, after Coach Cal’s inaugural club took out (2) St. John’s.

SUNDAY Previews

(10) New Mexico (24%) vs (2) Michigan St – 7:40 PM CST – TNT

New Mexico takes on Michigan St in a battle of two strong defensive teams. The Lobos — #19 Adjusted Defensive Efficiency per KenPom — seek to control the interior, limiting offensive rebounds and blocking shots, while the Spartans — #5 in the same metric — completely shut down three point shooting (27.1% for #1 nationally) and also look to limit offensive rebounds. New Mexico plays very quickly (#6 in Adjusted Tempo) but this year’s Spartan team is not as sluggish as the past two — mid-tempo overall and have been operating all March at a pace similar to the Lobos’. To our eye, Michigan St looks like a more-complete version of New Mexico, and the best upset recipe for UNM is turning Sparty over, using their height advantage, and making hay at the foul line — these are the themes running through the few defeats Michigan St have suffered thus far.

In the twelve games since first year Jase Richardson was inserted into the starting lineup, he has been the KenPom Game MVP in three of them, all MSU wins. It’s a testament to the quality of depth of this Michigan St club that their top pro prospect only recently gained a starting spot. Coen Carr and Tre Holloman were absolutely sensational off the bench vs Bryant in round one.

(12) Colorado St (24%) vs (4) Maryland – 6:10 PM CST – TBS

Colorado State‘s Nique Clifford is #6 in the KenPom Player of the Year rankings, and leads the country with 20 KenPom Game MVPs this season – more than Auburn’s Johni Broome, Creighton’s Ryan Kalkbrenner & Duke’s Cooper Flagg. He may be the best player you’ve never heard of before today. Maryland’s offensive pattern seems to be take care of the ball, avoid getting your shots blocked, and shoot well enough to convert your number of shots advantage to victory. This does not sound terribly exciting, but it’s been effective and worked particularly well against Grand Canyon in round one; the Terps shot 50% from the free throw line but won handily. It seems the Rams will need an NBA-audition-level performance from Clifford to pull off the upset and go to their first Sweet Sixteen since 1969.

Maryland might cede the Best Player in the Game title today to Nique Clifford, but they wil endeavor to have the three next best from their starting five. Darik Queen has been a revelation as a freshman and should be a lottery pick in June. This Terps club are up to #11 in the KenPom, their best team since the 2000 edition under Mark Turgeon finished the cancelled season also #11.

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and Basketball Reference
Game Score metric created by John Hollinger detailed here
Plot format by Aaron Baggett
Inspiration from Rock M Nation and Bill Connelly

Team colors courtesy:
Benjamin S. Baumer and Gregory J. Matthews (2020). teamcolors: Color Palettes for Pro Sports Teams. R package version 0.0.4