More in depth bracket talk

This year I am sticking with two brackets. One involves my gut, the other a bit more math. Below, I will break down the bracket and give you my gut reaction and what the math says. “Sleepers” simply means first round upset.

MIDWEST:
Sleepers:
Gut – Georgia Tech
Math: Georgia Tech, Northern Iowa
E8
Gut – Kansas over Georgetown
Math: Kansas over Georgetown

The Midwest was almost exactly the same in both brackets. I did have Georgia Tech and Maryland in the S16 with my gut, and Michigan State and Ohio State with the math.

WEST
Sleepers:
Gut – Florida State, UTEP, Florida
Math – UTEP
E8
Gut – Pitt over Vanderbilt
Math – BYU over Syracuse

This is the toughest to pick. God bless you if you do well here. In the math, as you can see, BYU made a run all the way to the Final Four, with UTEP in the Sweet 16. I have FSU beating Syracuse if they make it that far. I think if Syracuse gets out of the first weekend, then they will be tough to stop.

EAST
Sleepers
Gut – Wofford, Washington, Missouri
Math – Washington, Missouri
E8
Gut – Kentucky over New Mexico
Math – Kentucky over New Mexico

Don’t sleep on New Mexico. As you can see by the math putting BYU in the Final Four, that’s a tough conference, the WAC. Also, Marquette is one of the most overseeded teams in the tournament.

SOUTH
Sleepers
Gut – Louisville, Utah State, Old Dominion
Math – Siena, Old Dominion
E8
Gut – Baylor over Louisville
Math – Duke over Villanova

Wow, is this one tough too. According to my calculations, Old Dominion should have actually been seeded HIGHER than Notre Dame. Amazing.  My gut has Purdue simply squaring off against some easy competition and losing to a Louisville team because of the “Purdue turns to crap every third game” pattern. Louisville is also a bad matchup for Duke, and Siena is egregiously underseeded.

In the Final Four, I picked Kentucky over Kansas every time, because, well, that’s just what I think (and what the math thinks) will happen. Good luck, and happy bracketeering!