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

Before we get into the NBK update, congratulations to lemasteb for Outwitting, Outplaying, Outlasting all others in Rush the Court’s College Basketball Survivor pool. Best CBB pool on the internet. Pick two teams from the top six conferences to win all their games that week, then you can’t use them again the rest of the season. Be sure to sign up next November.

SATURDAY
Utah St took San Diego St to the final minutes but fell in the end to the Aztecs 62-57. San Diego St continues its hegemony in the most NBK-friendly conference of late: the Mountain West. Computers still like the Aggies and they seem to be reasonably well-positioned in that First Four Byes range.

Florida Atlantic beat UAB soundly 78-56 to take the Conference USA tournament title and automatic bid. They did not need it to get in. FAU and fellow NBKer Charleston are going to be lumped together in talking head circles in the days to come — with identical 31-3 records and coming from the ranks of the unknown — but FAU will be thrown into the 8/9 fray while Charleston lurks in the seed equivalent of the dunker spot as a 12-seed. Good spots for both, from where we sit.

Iona struggled to rid themselves of Marist, as still more blood drained from the head of soon-to-be-St-Johns-coach(?) Rick Pitino in the process. The Gaels needed this one to get in, and they got the job done 76-55. They will be an underdog but will not sneak up on anyone, as Pitino will be in the news all week.

Toledo fell to Kent St, in one that hurts real bad at the NBK central office. The Rockets were riding a 19-game win streak, having run the table since a loss to — you guessed it — Kent St back in January. And not only have they Never Been Kissed, Toledo has never even gotten to hold hands. Their last NCAA Tournament appearance was in 1980, the days of Pee Wee Lenard and Prince Bridges. Shake it off and come back strong next year, Rockets. We’ll save you a spot.

Vermont handled UMass Lowell and will renew their pursuit of a Sweet Sixteen berth once again next week. They got a little projected-seed bump as well with some upsets from above.

SELECTION SUNDAY
Yale (58%) at Princeton – 11 AM CDT

Only one NBKer game – here’s the full slate for Sunday:

Behold! Our final Never Been Kissed rankings on the morning of Selection Sunday. In years past we’ve tweaked the formula for the pre-Selection-Show edition, shuffling the teams around based on Most Favorable Projected Seed versus KenPom Rank. This year we don’t have time for that, so we’ll stick with KenPom Rank and Bracketology status as our key metrics.

Data courtesy Kenpom.com and ESPN Bracketology and ESPN Bubble Watch ($) and NCAA.com

Busy times at WAB HQ means we are late getting started with this year’s effort to track the fates of those schools who have never made the Sweet Sixteen — Never Been Kissed (NBK) — since the NCAA Men’s Basketball tournament expanded to 64 teams back in 1985. What’s a Billiken favorites Saint Louis could play their way onto this list with a win in the A-10 semifinal this afternoon over tormentor VCU.

Five NBKers have made it to their conference tournament championship game today. They’re on the edge (the edge) of glory:

#1 Utah St (45%) vs San Diego St – 5 PM CST
#3 Florida Atlantic (59%) vs UAB – 7:30 PM CST
#11 Iona (89%) vs Marist – 6:30 PM CST
#12 Toledo (47%) vs Kent St. – 6:30 PM CST
#17 Vermont (66%) vs UMass Lowell – 10 AM CST

Utah St, Boise St, Yale, and Tulane will play today in the semifinals. Enjoy the action.

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

The Billikens travel to…wherever Iona University is located…for a non-conference showdown with the Fightin’ Pitinos. We’ll take a Whatsabilliken look at the matchup as we do, by looking at how everyone fared the last time these two met and how these players rate versus others in the program’s recent history.

SLU prevailed 68-67 in January’s tightly contested game at Chaifetz Arena. The Bills overcame 21% three-point shooting and 19 turnovers thanks to the outsized efforts of Francis Okoro (13 points, 14 rebounds, 4 blocks) and Fred Thatch Jr. coming off the bench (9 points, 7 rebounds, 3 steals). Assuming everyone regresses to their mean tonight, the difference should come from players the Gaels did not have to face last year — Javon Pickett (transfer from Missouri), Jake Forrester (transfer from Temple, Indiana), and Javonte Perkins (injured all last year). The quality depth of the Billikens and multiple scoring options have allowed Perkins to ease into his return slowly.

As for the Gaels, in last season’s game Quinn Slazinski drew fouls on virtually every member of the Chaifetz family and was a perfect 8-8 from the foul line to lead the Iona attack. Slazinski has not played since the first two games of the year and appears to be out due to a high ankle sprain. No word on his availability tonight. Geographically-appropriately-named Nelly Junior Joseph (come on) also battled Okoro down low but could not overtake the SLU big man. With Slazinski likely out, and assuming Walter Clayton Jr returns to form a bit the one we’ll have our eye on is newcomer Daniss Jenkins. The 6’3″ junior from Dallas, TX transferred from Pacific this year and is putting up lots o’ shots, with games of 14 heaves, 14 jacks, and even 15 launches. But in the Gaels last game vs Canisius, Jenkins handed out 9 assists — a career-high by far — so we’ll see how much he’s in a sharing mood. Tis the season and whatnot.

The Gaels this year do not turn the ball over (#2 in the country in Off TO% per KenPom) and they block a lot of shots (#5 in Defensive Block %). They are likely to push the pace while the Bills slow it down. SLU’s advantage in Offensive Rebounding is likely to be offset by Iona’s advantage in Three-Point Shooting. KenPom gives SLU the slight edge (53% win probability) and we also expect this one to come down to the wire, once again. Ring out 2022 just as we rang it in.

References

Data from Basketball Reference and Ken Pomeroy and SLUBillikens.com and the NCAA

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.

Presented with little comment are the Top 5 prospects for tonight’s NBA Draft, in our order of preference.

1. Paolo Banchero – Duke

2. Keegan Murray – Iowa

3. Jaden Ivey – Purdue

4. Chet Holmgren – Gonzaga

5. Jabari Smith – Auburn

OK, here’s some comment:

Smith seems set to be the Number One pick by Orlando tonight, and I admit much of my anti-Smith bias comes from his two extremely forgettable performances against the teams I watch consistently. I was there in person on 12/18/2021 when the rumblings of his lottery pick status were beginning, and he posted a mediocre 13 points and 4 rebounds in a game Auburn struggled to win. Then a few weeks later 1/25/2022 he had only 5 points (added 10 rebounds) as Auburn struggled to shake pedestrian Mizzou. As the Auburn postseason ship was sinking, I was impressed with his increased rebounding — 9+ boards in five of their final seven games — but it was not enough to keep the ship afloat.

Paolo looks like the best player in this draft, leading a very-talented but oddly constructed Duke team to the Final Four with Coach K heading for the exit.

Keegan’s shot is a thing of beauty.

Ivey compares favorably to everybody’s favorite budding superstar Ja Morant.

Chet can do it all…but did not do it as well as one of our favorites — jackrabbit forward Brandon Clarke. And he’s probably the least consistent of these candidates. Many kinks to be worked out.

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

(8) North Carolina vs (1) Kansas – 8:20 PM CDT on TBS

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

Let’s take a WAB-style look at the Final Four matchups for this historic Saturday.

(2) Villanova vs (1) Kansas – 5:09 PM CDT on TBS

Looking first at Villanova, let’s start with the excellence of Jermaine Samuels these past two weeks. Samuels is the only player across all the Final Four teams who has out-performed his career during this year’s tournament run. (We’ll see later that Duke’s Wendell Moore Jr. and Kansas’ Remy Martin were very close to matching this Samuels’ feat.) With Justin Moore out after tearing his achilles at the end of the Houston game, Eric Dixon and Collin Gillespie will need to join Samuels in out-playing themselves.

Kansas rode the Remy Matin reclamation project for the first three rounds, then overwhelmed Miami in the second half of their Elite Eight matchup. Mitch Lightfoot has been Remyesque, while Jalen Wilson and Christain Braun have been pretty steady and solid. Kansas went small to finish off Miami, leaving David McCormack on the bench while they ratcheted up the pace. Villanova already is small, without many viable options on the bench.

(8) North Carolina vs (2) Duke – 7:49 PM CDT on TBS

Armando Bacot has been fantastic thus far, and Brady Manek has had a couple of huge performances. Since they are the only two current Heels that perform above the average Heel (red dashed line) it seems fair to state UNC can’t win without those two going off.

Duke also has two big dudes up at the top of their ratings. Mr Inside Mark Williams and Mr All-Around Paolo Banchero. With AJ Griffin and Trevor Keels under-performing, it’s been Wendell Moore Jr who has picked up their slack.

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

Taking a WAB look at the players in today’s Elite Eight matchups, their performance in the last game relative to their usual, and how they compare with others at the same school over the past eleven-ish seasons.

(10) Miami vs (1) Kansas – 1:20 PM CDT on TBS

(15) Saint Peter’s vs (8) North Carolina – 4:05 PM CDT on TBS

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.

(5) Houston vs. (2) Villanova – 5:09 PM CDT on TBS

(4) Arkansas vs. (2) Duke – 7:49 PM CDT on TBS

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.