The NCAA Men’s Final Four takes place in Houston on Saturday, with Oklahoma and Villanova tipping off first, followed by North Carolina and Syracuse. There has been no shortage of drama in the tournament this year, but following an Elite Eight that saw three of the four number one seeds sent home, there is still plenty of drama to come, so make sure you leave Saturday afternoon and evening wide open, or at least stay near your smartphone. Just about everyone has a busted bracket to this point, and anyone with even two of their final four teams still dancing, has to be smiling.
OSN staff writers Casey Mabbott (CM), Abe Asher (AA), Garrett Thornton (GT), and Patrick McEachern (PM) collaborated to share their views of the tournament so far, who the MVP is, and look in to their crystal balls to see who will be cutting down the nets on Monday evening.
- Who is your MVP of the tournament so far?
(CM) Buddy Hield. For the tournament, he is averaging 38 minutes, 29.3 points, 56% from the field, 46% from beyond the arc, 76% from the free throw line, and 7.5 rebounds per game. Those are stellar playoff numbers for anyone, but that’s exceptional for the clear-cut first option on offense, and the defense’s primary target. He’s helped Oklahoma beat Texas A&M and Oregon by a combined 26 points and made it look easy, there’s just no one still in the tourney that compares to what he is doing.
(AA) Buddy Hield. No team’s identity is built around a single player as much as Oklahoma’s is around Hield, and he’s delivered in a huge way during the last week. It’s been a long time since a senior dominated the tournament, and it’s refreshing. Hield is the NCAA system working (at least from an athletic perspective) – he’s gotten better each year he’s been at Oklahoma, and his draft stock has risen accordingly.
(GT) Buddy Hield has to be the MVP of the tournament so far. That is not much of a surprise to anyone that watched college basketball this year. Hield averaged 25 points, 5 rebounds and 2 assists per game this season and has boosted his production in the tournament; averaging 29.25 points, 6.5 rebounds, and 1.5 assists per game. He has been the one to step his game up when the competition got stiffer. His shooting single-handedly deflated an electrifying Oregon game in the Elite Eight. Hield was the best player in college basketball this season, and has been the best player in the tournament.
(PM) I really wanted to go outside the box here and choose someone like Syracuse’s Malachi Richardson here and highlight how he may not get all the headlines, but, he’s been the best player on the team making the most improbable run we’ve seen in years, etc., etc. And, while that may very well be true, let’s not kid ourselves here. There is only one real MVP of this tournament, and that’s the Nightmare from Norman, Buddy Hield.
Hield hasn’t just been the best player in the tourney this season, he’s been the best player we’ve seen in the NCAA’s in years. Hield is averaging nearly 30ppg while shooting an absurd 58% from the floor and 48% from behind the arc. That’s the kind of efficiency that screams “I could do even more if you need me to”. So far, Oklahoma hasn’t needed any more as they’ve cruised to the Final Four posting a double digit point differential through 4 games, mostly thanks to Hield’s otherworldly performance.
- The 2016 Elite Eight had all four #1 seeds active, but only one (UNC) made it to the Final Four. Were you surprised to see that many upsets in the Elite Eight?
(CM) I really thought Kansas would be able to get past Villanova, but they lacked composure down the stretch and virtually gave the game away in the closing minutes. Oregon’s high powered offense was supposed to be able to get them past the Sooners but Ducks star Dillon Brooks just looked lost trying to keep up with a red-hot Hield, and the rest of the team save for Elgin Cook just could not get the job done. I didn’t have a lot of confidence in Virginia, so seeing them go down to Syracuse didn’t surprise me.
(AA) Yes and no. Outside of the unusual consistency of the number one seeds, this has been an absolutely insane tournament. At some point, several of those top seeds were going to topple. History tells us that, in almost every year, no more than two number one seeds make the Final Four. Villanova over Kansas made sense. This is the toughest Wildcats team Jay Wright has ever had, and the Jayhawks, for all their balance, didn’t truly have a premier talent. Oklahoma was clearly better than Oregon. It’s Syracuse’s run that makes no sense. But Virginia getting upset in an ugly, low-scoring game? That certainly rung familiar.
(GT) Yes and no. I thought that Kansas and Virginia were the safest bets in the Elite Eight, boy was I wrong. I knew that Oregon was matched up against a great player and a disciplined team. I thought that there would be at least 2 #1 seeds advancing to the Final Four. But it should be no surprise that there were so many upsets. The teams playing at this point of the tournament have earned their right to be there, they have performed on the biggest stage, and they have won when they needed to win. The tournament seems to have more parity each year. After watching #15 Middle Tennessee beat #2 Michigan State in the First Round, should we really be surprised by anything?
(PM) Yes, and no. This season saw an NCAA record number of losses for teams ranked in the top 10, so, with that kind of parity at the top of the sport, a wild and wacky tournament was to be expected. And, in the opening round we got craziness, with every seed notching a first round win… except the 16-seeds. Then in the next two rounds, the top seeds finally asserted themselves and we got a very chalky Elite Eight, with 6 of the 8 teams being a 3-seed or higher.
But, once again, that parity that we all knew was out there finally re-took the reins and brought the madness back to March, as 3 1-seeds were knocked out in 3 consecutive games during the tournament’s second weekend. In the end, it was the parity that we all expected entering the tournament, it just took a little longer to kick in than we expected.
- What is the most shocking upset so far this year?
(CM) 2-seed Michigan State losing in the first round to 15-seed Middle Tennessee shattered just about every bracket in the nation, as Tom Izzo’s squad was the favorite tournament dark horse for many looking for a contender from the Mid-west region. So with the shock of the mighty Spartans still feeling fresh in my mind nearly two weeks later, I felt nothing when 10th seed Syracuse took down 1-seed Virginia in the Elite Eight.
(AA) Middle Tennessee over Michigan State. Unquestionably. This was the most shocking upset in the history of the tournament – an assertion that FiveThirtyEight more or less backs up. First of all, Michigan State seemed like the one team that was absolutely immune from this kind of insanity. Tom Izzo in March was automatic – and this Spartans team was about ten times better than the one he shepherded to the Final Four last year. But Middle Tennessee’s offensive explosion – which was the difference – came out of absolutely nowhere. For a team that ground their way through a hideous conference championship win over Old Dominion to get the dance, this game was literally One Shining Moment. The tournament will be hard-pressed to match this one.
(GT) Easily, Middle Tennessee beating Michigan State. Not only was Michigan State the #2 seed in the Midwest bracket; they won the Big 10 Conference Tournament, had a unanimous All-American in Denzel Valentine, and they were a very popular pick to win it all in a vulnerable region of the bracket (so vulnerable that 10 seed Syracuse won it!). Yet, in the first round, one of the best coached teams in the nation came out flat and just got flat beat by a 15 seed. That was the shocker of the tournament, and a game we will talk about for a long time.
(PM) While it’s a fool’s errand to put much faith in the common fan (myself included), it says something when, out of a field of 68, a whopping 22% of them choose one team to emerge victorious above all. When that team loses in the opening round, that’s a monumental upset, regardless of the scenario. When they lose to a 15-seed, without trailing for a single second at any point in the game, it starts entering the biggest upset of all time debate.
It wasn’t simply that Middle Tennessee State beat Michigan State, it was the way they did it. They thoroughly outplayed the Final Four favorites from East Lansing from the opening tip to the final whistle, which is the definition of shocking, especially for a Tom Izzo coached team. So, while this was a tournament full of mighty upsets and heart-stopping comebacks, there’s no way anything can compete with the Blue Raiders epic takedown of the once mighty Spartans.
- Who is your favorite remaining team to win the title and why?
(CM) North Carolina has been my favorite since day one and that hasn’t changed even with Buddy Hield playing on another level. The Tar Heels’ starting five is the only one of the remaining four teams with a legitimate superstar averaging over 20points per game and all five starters averaging double digit points, as well as the only team with a single player averaging a double-double on the season. Brice Johnson played nearly perfect games against Indiana and Notre Dame, and has averaged 21 points, 10 rebounds, 3.5 blocks, 64% from the field, and 88% from the free throw line, all in 33 minutes per game. Both Johnson and Hield turn on the fireworks in the biggest matchups, so we should all be hoping for an Oklahoma-UNC championship game, and see what these two stars can do when absolutely everything is on the line with the entire nation watching.
(AA) I think Villanova, Oklahoma, and North Carolina all have legitimate shots. I’ll take UNC, but just because they have the easier draw by getting Syracuse in the semifinal matchup. ‘Nova-OU could be a classic, and the championship game could be as well. Just as they have been all season, the margins are incredibly thin.
(GT) Oklahoma. That is a good team, with a very good coach, and a great player. Oklahoma showed their athleticism in the Elite Eight. Oregon was a team that was known for being more athletic than any team they played, they completely dominated Duke from the opening tip. However, Oklahoma was the more athletic team on the floor last Saturday. Their defense was very solid and disciplined, and their offense was explosive. If Hield can continue to shoot the ball the way that he has, watch out, because Oklahoma will be cutting down the nets on the 4th.
(PM) Full disclosure: I chose Michigan State to win this tourney, and then led for exactly zero seconds in their one game. So, you may not want to put much trust in my tournament picks this year.
That being said, with such an unpredictable tournament so far, this looks like an obvious title matchup in the making. Oklahoma has used the tournament’s best player to tear through their half of the bracket, while on the other side, North Carolina has used the tournament’s most talented overall roster to decimate theirs. Neither team has been seriously challenged thus far. And, with all due respect to Villanova and Syracuse, who are both more than capable of pulling off the upset, I’m not expecting either team to get tripped up this weekend.
In the end, I expect North Carolina’s superior depth and overall talent to prevail and cut down the nets in Houston. The wild card, as always, is Buddy Hield pulling a Steph Curry and just single-handedly winning the title for the Sooners, but, if there is anybody left in the tourney that can overcome a 40-point onslaught from the game’s best player, it’s this Carolina team that coolly dropped a 101-spot on Big Ten champ Indiana and has barely been challenged thus far in the tourney. If they continue to play as they have in the first four games, I fully expect the NCAA basketball title to make a short trip down Tobacco Road from its current home in Durham all the way to neighboring Chapel Hill.
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