16 Seed beats a Number 1 Seed?

[Dandy]

Never gonna happen.

 

[Cincyclone]

Can't believe how many people are saying never. Never is a looooong time. Plus it isn't like it hasn't come close to happening about a half dozen times in the last few decades.

 

[Dandy]

Can't believe how many people are saying never. Never is a looooong time. Plus it isn't like it hasn't come close to happening about a half dozen times in the last few decades.

[video=youtube;MZ2DbqFIPtk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZ2DbqFIPtk[/video]

 

[Goothrey]

Only if a mid major like Wichita St. gets the 1 seed will it ever be a possibility.

 

[Cincyclone]

[video=youtube;MZ2DbqFIPtk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZ2DbqFIPtk[/video]

Almost doesn't count as a win but it shows that it's not some unrealistic thing

 

[aeroclone]

Never is a long, long time. Given enough chances it will happen. There will probably be one in my lifetime, but when it occurs is anyone's guess.

 

[jcyclonee]

A March Madness conversation with a friend got me thinking: "When will we see the upset of a #1 by a #16 seed?"

I did a little digging having known that 16 seeds are 0-120 against #1's. I can't believe that TWO 16 seeds came within one point of winning in the same season.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCAA_Men's_Division_I_Basketball_Championship_upsets

We've had 30 years of the tournament in it's current format without it happening. So when do you think it will happen?

Alonzo Mourning fouled the Princeton player big time on the last second shot. Georgetown was one of the "Blue Bloods" at the time.

 

[Cyclonepride]

The funny thing is that most of the close calls (if I am remembering correctly) happened over 20 years ago, though I would assert that the overall talent gap between top and bottom has diminished to an extent.

 

[algonacy]

Never is my vote and I stick with it. The stats guys who say "eventually' need to remember we've only been playing this game for an eye-blink compared to forever. It will take forever for this to occur. So when I say 'never' I guess what I really mean is not in my lifetime.

 

[TykeClone]

The funny thing is that most of the close calls (if I am remembering correctly) happened over 20 years ago, though I would assert that the overall talent gap between top and bottom has diminished to an extent.

This is an interesting question and I did some more checking.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCAA_Men's_Division_I_Basketball_Championship_upsets#15_seeds

In 2011, the tournament expanded to the first four game 0th round (which is the terminology that they should use).

Since then, the pool of 16 seeds has been diluted with the worst 4 teams whittled down to 2 in those games. 2011-2014 saw 16 first round 1/16, 2/15, 3/14 games. I got my numbers below from counting in the above link and chose two timeframes - 2011-2014 (4 years with the play in game as we have it now) and 2007-2010 (the same length of time before it was changed).

No 16 seeds won.

3 15 seeds won - ~19% success rate. Compare that to 0 winds in the prior 4 years (and 0 winds since that fateful loss that shall not be named)

2 14 seeds won - 12.5% success rate - also better than the 1 win in the prior 4 years.

3 13 seeds won - ~19% success rate - 4 of them won in the prior 4 years.

9 12 seeds won - a 56% success rate - only 6 won in the prior 4 years. I think this is the area where the play in games are showing more effect because they are adding more average type teams or underperforming teams to the tournament.

8 11 seeds won - a 50% success rate - only 6 won in the prior 4 years.