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December 19, 2024 | (Noah Frank)
WASHINGTON — It is hard to remember a year with more parity throughout college basketball than this one.
No team has fewer than four losses. Kansas (27-4), the best team in the country, lost to Oklahoma State (12-19), which lost to Missouri State (13-19), which lost to Southeast Missouri State (5-24), one of the very worst of the 351 Division I teams.
Of last year’s Sweet 16, two teams (UCLA and NC State) will miss the field without a miracle run to their respective conference tournament championships, with another on the bubble (Gonzaga), and a fourth banned from postseason play (Louisville).
The team with the top recruit in the nation, LSU, likely needs to win their conference tournament to have any chance of getting in.
With the field more unpredictable and wide open than ever, we built our own bracketology model, with the intent to attempt to predict the field of 68 as it is announced on Sunday. We have a few notable differences from some other sites, as you will see in the slides above.
Our methodology relies on record, conference rating (per KenPom.com), RPI, BPI, Top 50 wins, record against the top 100, bad losses, and additional bonuses or penalties for making the finals of and winning a conference tournament championship. It’s our first run, so it may not be perfect, but so far there aren’t any real outlying results, as far as we can tell. Sunday will be the first true test.
