Predicting the winner of the NCAA March Madness tournament

If you’ve made it to the back page of The Record, your March is almost certainly already mad.

I’m from a place where we pretend we don’t celebrate St. Patrick’s Day every day in order to celebrate it for an entire month, so I understand your desire for more madness better than most.

The key to March Madness and making it home during St. Patrick’s Month is methodology.

If you didn’t know I was a huge nerd, you should first of all buy me a drink sometime, and second accept my apology for the next few sentences.

I organized the 64 teams in the NCAA tournament using ten weighted metrics ranging from low to high relevance, awarding each team a score out of 100 (that being the best if statistically possible).

Those ten metrics in order of highest to lowest relevance are: three-point percentage, field goal percentage, NET ranking (a ranking of 353 DI teams calculated by the NCAA), true shooting percentage, rebounds per game, points in the paint and points per game, steals per game, blocked shots per game and finally bench points per game.

This methodology produces some upsets that are seriously worth looking at. Loyola Chicago scores a 50.3 compared to Ohio State’s 46.6. Loyola beating Ohio State in the first round is hardly unpredictable and barely an upset. Yet the methodology carries the Ramblers all the way to the Elite Eight, a far less expected feat in the face of one of the tougher bracket divisions.

In fact, the methodology likes Loyola Chicago over Villanova in the second round and Tennessee in the third. Tennessee has been consistently playing some of the best basketball in the country in the violently competitive Southeastern Conference; you should be scared picking the Missouri Valley champion over the third best team in this season’s best conference. Loyola is, however, one of the oldest and smartest teams in college basketball and the fact that 36% of their points come from their bench means they play aggressive even deep into the second half.

The University of Alabama-Birmingham sits one basis point higher than perennial success story Houston, who made it to the final four in 2021. Houston enters the dance without their two best players, guards Tramon Mark and Marcus Sasser, and their biggest asset is their head coach. Not a great recipe for success against a fast-paced team with catch and shoot abilities like UAB. However, losses to teams like Marshall and Old Dominion make UAB a less attractive upset.

Fast-paced offensive demons like South Dakota State fare well under this methodology. The Jackrabbits face a tough first round matchup against Providence, whose wins over Wisconsin and Texas Tech make them a solid fourth seed.

The Friars also dropped a March 1 game against Villanova, the sixth best team in the country, by just two points.

I think Villanova is wildly overrated this year and every year. They lost to Marquette, arguably the youngest and least experienced team in college basketball right now, twice—once by ten. All their scoring comes from their first six and a loss to Purdue demonstrates to me that they really can’t keep up with an aggressive NBA-style offense.

Yet they’re still one of the best teams in the country, and Providence played shot-for-shot basketball against them just two weeks ago. South Dakota State is actually the methodology’s third best team, their score of 69.2 falls behind only Gonzaga (82.6) and Arizona (71.5), and beats out both Duke (61) and Purdue (60.3). They are lights out shooters, dropping 45% of their shots from behind the arc and 52% from the field. They best Providence in every metric besides blocked shots per game, NET ranking and rebounds per game.

Let’s not forget though that South Dakota State plays St. Thomas twice a year. They’re playing up big time against pretty much anyone in the Big East and that matters in March. I’m not taking South Dakota State over a team that has proven it can beat NBA talent up and down the court, even when my own methodology favors them by 30 basis points.

You can decide for yourself what that says about me making it home during St. Patrick’s month.

Another team the methodology really likes is Iowa. They’ll beat 12 seed Richmond easily in the first round to face either Providence or SDSU, either of whom they will beat. From there it gets trickier. They’ll likely face No. three Kansas in the sweet sixteen where the methodology favors them by exactly two basis points. Iowa’s Keegan Murray is possibly following former teammate and current Detroit Piston Luka Garza to the Naismith Men’s Player of the Year Award, which the latter won in 2021.

They’re playing much better defense than they were last year and have sacrificed nothing on offense to do so.

Kansas has the nation’s best player in Ochai Agbaji and they looked pretty good in the Big 12 tournament. They’re not as deep or as athletic as other teams, and I personally think this Kansas team is primed for a sweet sixteen upset loss to Iowa.

I’m actually bringing Iowa all the way to the final four with an elite eight win over a Wisconsin team they lost by nine to earlier in the year.

Iowa might be the hottest team in college basketball heading into the tournament. They’re coming off dominant wins against Indiana and No. 10 Purdue in the Big Ten Tournament, and watching their defense click during those games makes me think the Hawkeyes are poised for a deep run.

I have them losing to Arizona.

There are some great teams that get completely overlooked by this methodology. Wisconsin comes in at 27.7.

They’re not losing to some team from Pennsylvania? Maine? (New York) in the first round even if that team tallies 47.9 basis points.

It’s hard for me to imagine even Louisiana State or Iowa State beating them in the second round, especially considering Louisiana State fired their coach on March 12 and Iowa State has probably the worst offense in DI college basketball. Iowa will pick them off if the Badgers can get past a super tough sweet sixteen matchup against Auburn or Miami.

Miami is a team that could make a decent run if they can get past No. 22 USC in the first round and No. 8 Auburn in the second round. They have a couple of players who’ve been playing college basketball since I was literally a sophomore in high school, and wins against Duke and North Carolina mean they’re not afraid of anyone this March.

You’re already losing to the Madness if you read this far, maybe even more than the guy who wrote this far.

Arizona is going to win. It’s the SEC’s year. Watch out for UCLA and Iowa.

There’s some value to my nerdiness, but we both know you’re just going to pick the prettier logo and use March Madness as an excuse to not pay attention in class.