This past Saturday, Michigan was, as expected, announced as the number one overall seed in the NCAA Selection Committee’s Top 16 reveal.
Unfortunately, the Wolverines’ hold on this distinction proved short-lived. After Michigan fell to Duke — the Selection Committee’s number two overall team — on a neutral court in our nation’s capital, most bracketologists, including me, have moved the Blue Devils up to the top overall spot at the expense of the maize and blue.
Michigan still owns a better resume and quality metrics across the board. But when two adjacent teams play a late-season neutral-floor head-to-head matchup, the winner pretty much has to be above the loser.
But all was not lost over the weekend. While Michigan may not have gotten the result it wanted in Washington, D.C., several other high-profile games broke its way, with highly seeded teams Houston, Iowa State, and, most importantly (and most improbably), Illinois each losing. The Illini loss opened the door for Michigan to clinch at least a share of the regular-season conference title before its trip to Champaign. That Houston lost again on Monday night was just icing on the cake.
How much does the Duke loss actually hurt? Is there still a path for Michigan to get the number one overall seed on March 15th? And where does Michigan stand in relation to the other potential 1-seed challengers?
I’ll get to all of that and more. But first, let’s start as we always do — by looking at the numbers.
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