play-in/first round question/complaint...

i'm sure this was more of a hot topic when we were involved in this game a few years ago but i just cant see the rationale of having 2 of the 4 play in games being for an 11 seed. this is simply NOT fair and doesnt make sense to the teams that get stuck playing that game. i can understand it for the 16 seeds if you just HAFTA have the 68 team field instead of the 64 team field but playing in to try to be an 11 seed is ridiculous when you have 2 other 11 seeds, and 4 12-15 seeds who get to sit and wait until the "second" round to play.

this would be like making the 5-8 seeds play their way into the ACC tourney while the 9-12 seeds get in automatically.

i just cant understand the reasoning behind it. anybody know the fairness/point to it?

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There is some reason to the madness

Mar 22, 2013, 10:07 AM

It is the last 4 auto-bid teams (the 16 games), and then the last four at-large teams into the field, which is very well established here and elsewhere. You say there should be consistency, but in fact there is. It is the lowest 4 at large teams.

The lowest seeded at large teams in the field (when seeded 1-68) were #11 St Mary's, #11 Middle Tenn St, #13 Boise State and #13 LaSalle. Generally these are 12 seeds but this year some conference champions were seeded as a 12 seed (Ole Miss, Oregon, Akron). Cal was the other 12 seed, but it was openly stated by the committee that Cal (and Oregon) were both initially on the 11 seed line, but had to be dropped due to logistics of arranging games and avoiding match-ups which left them no other choice but to put them as a 12 seed.

So either you would have to mandate that all non-power conference champions must be seeded below a 12, or you have to arbitrarily demote all teams that are at-large. Now I am all for there being a rule that says teams playing in the First Four cannot have a 2nd round game before 6 PM two days later

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Re: play-in/first round question/complaint...

12 seeds are historically pretty good

Re: 12 seeds are historically pretty good

There is some reason to the madness

Re: There is some reason to the madness

The play-in games do involve the last 4 at-large teams.

Re: The play-in games do involve the last 4 at-large teams.

it supposedly matches up the last four in

agreed...usually the 14-16 seeds are automatic qualifiers

your bracket is looking pretty good....

Re: play-in/first round question/complaint...My feeling

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