Bracketology: SEC dominates college basketball forecast for the NCAA tournament field
The SEC was conspicuously absent from Monday night’s College Football Playoff national championship game. But the conference is all over the first USA TODAY Sports edition of bracketology for the 2024-25 college basketball season, with a tournament-best 13 teams in the field and multiple earning a No. 1 seed.
Auburn is the top overall seed thanks to 10 Quad 1 wins. After beating Mississippi State on Tuesday night, Tennessee joins the Tigers as the second SEC team on the No. 1 line. The Tigers host the Volunteers on Saturday night.
Rounding out the No. 1 seeds are Duke and Iowa State. The Blue Devils have won 12 in a row and handed Auburn its only loss the season. The Cyclones are 16-2 with a narrow loss to Auburn and another defeat in Big 12 play to West Virginia.
The Crimson Tide are the strongest No. 2 seed and are narrowly behind Tennessee with the possibility of a flip by next week. Florida, which beat Tennessee by 30 points earlier this month, is also a No. 2.
The other SEC teams in this early projection are No. 3 Kentucky, No. 4 Mississippi State, No. 4 Texas A&M, No. 5 Mississippi, No. 7 Missouri, No. 10 Oklahoma, No. 10 Vanderbilt and No. 11 Texas. The Longhorns are projected to meet San Diego State in a play-in game.
Two big-name teams are absent from our bracketology.
One is North Carolina, which slipped to 12-8 overall after Tuesday night’s loss at Wake Forest. The Tar Heels are a pitiful 1-7 in Quad 1 games. The second is Arkansas, which has faceplanted out of the gate under new coach John Calipari. Despite getting some preseason love as a potential Final Four team, the Razorbacks are 12-7 overall, 1-5 in the SEC and 2-7 against Quad 1 competition, dumping them down to No. 54 in the NET rankings.
On the mid-major level, the Mountain West has only two teams in our bracket, No. 8 Utah State and the No. 11 San Diego State after putting six teams in the tournament last season.
An important note to keep in mind: This is an early glimpse at the potential tournament field, and a lot can and will change as teams continue to grind through conference play.
Last four in
Central Florida, Texas, San Diego State, Virginia Commonwealth.
Last four out
Wake Forest, Cincinnati, North Carolina, SMU.
NCAA Tournament bids conference breakdown
Multi-bid leagues: SEC (13), Big Ten (9), Big 12 (8), Big East (4), ACC (4), Atlantic 10 (2), Mountain West (2), West Coast (2).
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