Michigan Earns Three-Seed, Draws Montana In First Round
Michigan will be dancing in Wichita. [Marc-Gregor Campredon[
After the most inane bracket reveal in the history of television, we now know the NCAA Tournament bracket in full (pdf here). Michigan is the three-seed in the West region; they'll play Big Sky champion Montana on Thursday in Wichita.
UPDATE: Per Tony Paul of the Detroit News, Michigan will get the late tipoff on Thursday, approximately 9:50 pm ET.
While it rankles that Michigan State, also a three-seed, got the coveted placement in Detroit over their superior rivals, the Wolverines got the better draw. The Spartans get Kansas-Duke-Auburn as the 1-, 2-, and 4-seed in their region. Michigan drew Xavier (easily the weakest one-seed), North Carolina, and Gonzaga.
Even though Montana is the top-ranked 14-seed on KenPom, Michigan should match up well with them. The Grizzlies start two paint-bound bigs and rely heavily on forcing turnovers to spark their defense. They also lean hard on point guard Ahmaad Rorie, who gets to deal with Zavier Simpson.
Should the Wolverines avoid a massive upset, they'd draw the winner of Houston-San Diego State 6/11 game on Saturday. The Cougars rank 17th on KenPom, best of the six-seeds, but again the matchup looks decent on paper. The have an extreme high-usage point guard, Rob Gray, who'll draw Simpson. While they have a short, mobile frontcourt that should be able to switch against Michigan's offense, they're also quite small in the backcourt—three starters are 6'1" and no rotation player is taller than 6'8".
If the seeds hold to form, Michigan would then get a rematch with UNC in the Sweet Sixteen. That will undoubtedly be tough—you probably tried to forget the 86-71 loss in the Dean Dome—but the Wolverines have become a completely different team since then. Plus, John Beilein wiht a week to prepare against an opponent he's already seen and so on. The location is a bit of a bummer, but the draw could be a whole lot worse.
We'll have much more on the Montana game and potential future opponents this week, including a podcast we'll record tomorrow and post on Tuesday.
ESPN shilling for MSU like they haven't actually watched MSU play. They're not that good guys. Lots of shiny talent... not actually a good basketball team.
without knowing about the unbalanced B1G schedule and that they underperform their talent level.
March 11th, 2018 at 10:51 PM ^
like Bilas, but he is wrong about MSU.
March 11th, 2018 at 10:51 PM ^
Rece, Jay, Seth, Jay and Dickie V all picked MSU to win it all. All of them also picked Gonzaga vs. Michigan in the regional finals. Weird. Does ESPN send out a memo or something.
The last time everyone from ESPN picked MSU, they lost to the 15 seed.
regional finals is the Elite 8. I didn't comment on Bilas' pick for the Final Four other than all 5 guys have MSU in it and winning it all.
MSU is such a weird team. I mean, they have the raw talent to win it all, I think at least. But they have like no gaurd depth. Winson, Tum Tum, Langford, Mcquaid are like their only true gaurds. Bridges ends up playing gaurd most of the time even though he can play the four quite well. All their depth is in the front court, so they run a lot of 2 big line ups. Usually that kind of inflexibility is not great for a good run against diverse teams in modern basektball.
Additionally, there is little data to say how good they actually are. As has been pointed out, they only beat two tournament teams all season, and only one on the road. Now, both of those wins are very very good. And the stats really like them too. But they're still kind of an enigma. They could go all the way, but there's little data to suggest they actually can at this point.
Do we have an evening game on Thursday? (The high seeds usually do, right?)
yes.
Day two will be an overwhelming Kansas crowd who probably won't give a damn. Thursday will be poorly attended in general.
against us because of the Trey shot.
For those of you who need it, here is the best printable version of the bracket:
http://i.turner.ncaa.com/sites/default/files/external/printable-bracket…
Just a few weeks ago we were talking about getting out of the 8/9 seed line. Monthlong winning streaks are nice.
BTW, the answer is that the NIT is never, ever better than the tournament.
But I agree, always better to be invited to the real dance.
Well I thought they had a good shot at a 3-seed.
In Dayton.
Live in LA. Can confirm I will be there for the S16 if we get that far.
based on the comments. That said, as a Bay Area resident, kinda happy I've got an excuse for a road trip down to LA if we don't lay an egg next weekend.
They go through Berry, to an extreme. If Z can contain him some, we have a shot.
Need Mo to not get a foul in the first two minutes and then be useless to us for the first half.
Teske in a vacuum may not be a superstar, but his particular role on this particular team is way underrated.
He does free up Mo to just go play. And the post defense does not fall off a cliff when he is in.
He's starting to make some shots too.
UNC's big thing is OREBs. That's how they generate extra shots. UM does this by low TO rate and getting DREBs. So it will be strength against strength. UM is a different team down the stretch, so it'll be an interesting match-up. If UM gets that far, they're really going to have to give a great DREB performance to win. And, as you say, Simpson limiting Berry. Honestly, Simpson as an on-ball defender will be key in most of the match-ups going forward. Most teams have a ball dominant gaurd that the offense runs through.
than Duke. I think Duke will be more beatable on Championship Monday.
Just a feeling.
March 11th, 2018 at 11:15 PM ^
Allen's an absolutely dreadful perimeter defender, slow as molasses moving laterally. I think he's the primary reason they've had to play zone, and somebody's going to take advantage. Could have been us--I think they would be a much better matchup than UNC.
Well down the stretch they've played really really well. They're right behind UM in efficency margin over the last month. Any team with that kind of raw talent is scary.
don't get shot before I see Montana.
I imagine Wichita will not be a friendly place for us given 2013. We may need extra commitment to get there so the KS fans don't drive all in attendance to boost the underdogs.
Trey Burke for 3!!!!!
Kansas has had four tournament eliminations since then. I don't know why they'd be so bitter about the 2013 game in particular.
Yeah, as a Michigan fan I wouldn't drive hours somewhere just to root for Notre Dame or Oregon to Kentucky get beat.
March 12th, 2018 at 11:07 AM ^
I think you are missing the point. Kansas is also in Wichita. Therefore they would be there for their own game, but also are more likely to be there for both sessions, not strictly to travel to root against Michigan.
March 12th, 2018 at 11:33 AM ^
I understand that, but I doubt they have a particular vendetta against Michigan. They punched our player in the crotch, not vice-versa.
I wasn't necessarily responding to you, I too think that the revenge factor was overhyped in the OP. Was just clarifying to the guy above that it wouldn't be that Kansas was going out of their way to head to Wichita to cheer against Michigan (which he implied), they will be there already.
To get extremely ahead of things (beat Montana), Kenpom says:
RD 1: Michigan -7 v Montana
RD 2: Michigan -2 v Houston/-6 v SDSU
S16: Michigan +1 v UNC/-4 v TAMU/-11 v Providence
E8: Michigan -1 v Xavier/+1 v Gonzaga/-1 v OSU
F4: Michigan +5 v Virginia/+2 v Cincinnati/PICK v Tenn/-2 v Arizona/-2 v Kentucky
CHAMP: MIchigan +5 v Villanova/PICK v Kansas/+4 v Duke/+2 v Purdue/+2 v MSU (lol)/PICK v TTU/-6 v Wichita/-6 v Auburn
March 11th, 2018 at 11:01 PM ^
looks like a rough 2nd round draw
March 11th, 2018 at 11:29 PM ^
agree - kenpom certainly has houston underseeded. i don't know much about them beyond that - they certainly gave cinci fits and beat wichita, which suggests they can hang. roster makeup sort of seems like a more talented nebraska, which would feel a lot more like trouble if not for yaklich having an answer against their smaller athletic lineup in the B1G tourney. i expect a battle there. montana grizz not a team that will roll over either, per kenpom.
March 11th, 2018 at 11:26 PM ^
double double
March 11th, 2018 at 11:27 PM ^
fucked around and got a triple double
March 11th, 2018 at 11:25 PM ^
RD 1: Michigan -12 v Montana
RD 2: Michigan -5 v Houston/-10 v SDSU
S16: Michigan PICK v UNC/-7 v TAMU/-11 v Providence
E8: Michigan -3 v Xavier/-1 v Gonzaga/-5 v OSU
F4: Michigan +5 v Virginia/PICK v Cincinnati/-3 v Tenn/-5 v Arizona/-5 v Kentucky
CHAMP: MIchigan +4 v Villanova/-3 v Kansas/+2 v Duke/-1 v Purdue/-2 v MSU (lol)/-4 v TTU/-4 v Wichita/-4 v Auburn
March 11th, 2018 at 11:32 PM ^
massey liking us vs everyone but virginia and villanova! i'll take that. you should have removed the "(lol)" behind MSU in that copy/paste tho. and i should have included one after kenpom gave us +2 vs purdue on a neutral.
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