NCAA Tournament - Historical Analysis of Top Seeds

Yesterday, I gave you the Top 10 Teams in Offensive & Defensive Efficiency and the Top 20 Teams Overall. Overall Efficiency has proved to be a good predictor for Final 4 teams.

Today, I am going to do a Historical Analysis of the tops seeds by year and what the Overall Efficiency Ranking is of the teams they lose to.

2007:

1 Seeds(Overall Rank): Florida(2) won championship, UNC(1)lost to Georgetown(7), Ohio St(4) lost to Florida(2), and Kansas(3) lost to UCLA(6)

2 Seeds: Georgetown(7) lost to Ohio St(4), Memphis(9) lost to Ohio St(4), Wisconsin(8) lost to UNLV(42) and UCLA(6) lost to Florida(2)

3 Seeds: Oregon(18) lost to Florida(2), Pitt(13) lost to UCLA(6), Wash St(29) lost to Vanderbilt(35), and Texas A&M(7) lost to Memphis(9)

4 Seeds: Maryland(10) lost to Butler(25), S. Illinois(28) lost to Kansas(3), Texas(21) lost to USC(27), and Virginia(45) lost to Tennessee(31)

Analysis: Last year there were really no major upsets among the top seeds. S. Illinois over Kansas and UNLV over Wisconsin were the biggest upsets. UNLV was ranked 35 in Offensive Efficiency and 42 in Defensive Efficiency so I'm not sure how they were only 42 overall. Also, Wisconsin is a slow paced team just like UNLV, so Wisconsin's main edge was probably nullified there. Southern Illinois was one of the slowest paced teams and was ranked 9 overall in defense, which is how they were able to slow down and beat a faster paced Kansas team.

2006:

1 Seeds: Duke(5) lost to LSU(10), Memphis(9) lost to UCLA(3), UConn(4) lost to George Mason(23), Villanova(7) lost to Florida(1)

2 Seeds: Texas(2) lost to LSU(10), UCLA(3) lost Florida(1), Tennessee(22) lost to Wichita St(32), Ohio St(18) lost to Georgetown(14)

3 Seeds: Iowa(19) lost to Northwestern St.(105), Gonzaga(41) lost to UCLA(3), UNC(8) lost to George Mason(23), Florida(1) won championship

4 Seeds: LSU(10) lost to UCLA(3), Kansas(6) lost to Bradley(26), Illinois(11) lost to Washington(13), Boston College(24) lost to Villanova(7)

Analysis: The main thing that jumps out here is how poorly seeded the # 1 seeds were. Texas, Florida, and UCLA all probably should have been # 1's along with UConn. This is probably why there were some many "upsets" in this tournament. Tennessee as a # 2 was way overseeded since they were ranked 22 overall, so it's no surprise they got bumped early by # 32 Wichita St.

The biggest upset here is Iowa losing to Northwestern St who was a #14 seed. Iowa probably should have been a # 5 seed, and while were 1st in Defensive Efficiency they also were ranked 129 in Offensive Efficiency, so they probably were even worse than 19 overall.

George Mason's string of upsets doesn't look as flukey when you look at their Overall Efficiency ranking of 23, they probably should have been a 5 seed. The other big upset here is Kansas losing to Bradley. Bradley was ranked 11 in Defensive Efficiency that year and actually was a faster paced team than Kansas.

2005:

1 Seeds: UNC(1) won championship, Illinois(2) lost to UNC(1), Duke(3) lost to Michigan St(7), and Washington(15) lost to Louisville(4)

2 Seeds: Oklahoma St(8) lost to Arizona(12), Wake Forest(9) lost to West Virginia(28), UConn(14) lost to North Carolina St(20), and Kentucky(10) lost to Michigan St(7)

3 Seeds: Gonzaga(32) lost to Texas Tech(30), Kansas(13) lost to Bucknell(91), Oklahoma(11) lost to Utah(22), and Arizona(12) lost to Illinois(2)

4 Seeds: Boston College(25) lost to Wisc.Milw.(42), Louisville(4) lost to Illinois(2), Florida(6) lost to Villanova(5), and Syracuse(18) lost to Vermont(62)

Analysis: Two big upsets here, Kansas losing to Bucknell and Syracuse losing to Vermont. Kansas lost to a Bucknell team ranked 33 in Defensive Efficiency. I also noticed that Kansas was in the middle of the pack as far as the pace they played at, so maybe they weren't as athletic of a team in 2005 as normal. Vermont had a decent rank of 55 in Offensive Efficiency but this upset is hard to explain.

2004:

1 Seeds: St Joe's(6) lost to Oklahoma St(3), Kentucky(9) lost to UAB(42), Duke(1) lost to UConn(2), and Stanford(14) lost Alabama(29)

2 Seeds: UConn(2) won championship, Oklahoma St(3) lost to Georgia Tech(7), Gonzaga(17) lost to Nevada (22), and Mississippi St(18) lost to Xavier(16)

3 Seeds: Pitt(4) lost to Oklahoma St(3), Georgia tech(7) lost to UConn(2), Texas(15) lost to Xavier(16), and NC State(8) lost to Vanderbilt(24)

4 Seeds: Wake Forest(20) lost to St Joe's(6), Kansas(13) lost to Georgia Tech(7), Cincinnati(12) lost to Illinois(11), and Maryland(19) lost to Syrace(25)

Analysis: Only one big upset here, Kentucky losing to UAB. UAB was ranked 27th in Defensive Efficiency and was one of the fastest paced teams out there. Their pressing fast paced style was a good matchup for them against a slower paced Kentucky team and this is what led to the upset here.

Overall Analysis:

You rarely see a # 1 seed ranked in the top 10 overall efficiency lose to another team who isn't in the top 10 overall.

Most times when a high seed loses a game, it is due to either them being seeded to high for their efficiency rating or if a change of pace is forced upon them from another good defensive minded team.

If looking for upsets, it might be best to see which teams are seeded too high and which are seeded too low based on overall efficiency. For instance, in 2006 #7 seed Georgetown had an overall efficiency rank of 14 and the knocked off # 2 seed Ohio St, which had an overall efficiency rank of 18.

Tomorrow I will do a similar analysis on the key bracket matchups, such as the 5 vs 12, 6 vs 11, 7 vs 10 matchups.

Make sure to enter my Tournament Pool as well, all the details are here.