Another week, another top-five road win, another chapter in the lore of the kid from Shawnee, Kansas. After handling Washington at home without too much fanfare, Illinois went to Nebraska and “Robbed the Bank”. Personally, if I were Brad Underwood, I would have used “Assassinate Lincoln” as my punny motivational catch phrase, but to each their own (too soon?).
With the wins at Purdue and Nebraska, Illinois is the only team in the country to boast two top-10 (For bracket purposes, by NET) road wins. Throw in the Iowa win, and they are the only team in the country with three top-20 road wins.
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Illinois has taken the Cornhuskers’ place as the top team on the 2-line, with Houston and Iowa State not far behind. There is still a gap to make it up to the 1-line though; while UConn has looked far from impressive squeaking out wins in a weak Big East, they still have only one loss and own the head-to-head win over the Illini.
Illinois needs to keep winning and it would take one bad loss, or two decent losses from UConn to move up a line. Michigan and Duke are likely two losses away from falling below Illinois as well (although the head-to-head in Champaign could play into the equation), and Arizona might have a three-loss cushion before they fall off the 1-line.
That said, if Baby Face and the Balkans can break the Breslin Center next weekend, it could change the both the metrics and the national narrative enough to overlook our larger loss column.
West (San Jose)
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UMBC/Maryland Eastern Shore
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Notes on the Region:
Tennessee gets its Loyola matchup, with small in-state Christian school Belmont getting its shot to take down the state school who would never dare to schedule them in non-conference. Belmont leads the country in shooting percentage and is efficient from both inside and outside the arc, an ideal recipe for the classic 5-12 upset.
Indiana moves safely above the bubble zone for now, after getting their first two Quad 1 wins (and first two wins over tourney teams) of the season against Purdue and at UCLA. Their reward is a first-round matchup against a tough Utah State team, followed by a matchup against Arizona where they would not have much of a prayer matching up against the Wildcats interior size, strength and skill.
Nebraska follows in the footsteps of Iowa State and Vanderbilt earlier this year by ending a long undefeated start to the season with an immediate two-game losing streak. Since those losses came against elite teams (Michigan and Illinois), Nebraska is still able to hold on to the 2-line for now, where they draw the West Coast Conference tag team, with Saint Mary’s as a possibility in the second round before getting their big brother Gonzaga in the Sweet Sixteen.
Midwest (Chicago)
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Merrimack/Bethune-Cookman
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Notes on the Region:
Michigan moves back up to the second overall seed following their rivalry win at Michigan State. It doesn’t shape up as much of a reward though, as this looks to me like the toughest region in this iteration. I would not be surprised if any of the top four seeds made a run to the championship game, and the 5-10 seeds, except SMU, are all highly talented rosters who have underperformed to a certain degree this season but could put it together at the right time.
Mick Cronin gets a homecoming game of sorts against Louisville, where he worked as an assistant under Rick Pitino for a few seasons early in his coaching career. Whiny Mick will of course complain about how unfair it is that his team has to play in Saint Louis and Chicago, as the two-hour time shift just completely throws off his bedtime routine of shining his scalp and shouting at his toothpaste to defend the gums better.
East (Washington D.C.)
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Notes on the Region:
Buffalo better hope Michigan State and Michigan don’t share a hotel, as Tom Izzo and Dusty May are liable to throwdown in the lobby, after each made comments about how dirty the other team’s players play. A second-round matchup for the Spartans with Clemson pits two of the most defensively tilted squads in the pool against each other, as they both try to flail their way to 65 points.
Houston against Navy in the first round will probably have Hakeem Olajuwon and David Robinson in attendance and shown by the network cameras 100 times, as talking about 80s’ legends will be more interesting than the chokehold the Houston defense likely puts on Navy. If Houston and Michigan State both make the Sweet Sixteen, expect the most physical game of the entire tournament when old heads Izzo and Sampson collide.
South (Houston)
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Notes on the Region:
Illinois’ championship run begins against the East Tennessee State Buccaneers. The Southern Conference favorites most discernible skill is getting steals, with the 6th highest rate in the country. However, Illinois have one of the lowest turnover rates in the country, so I would expect Keaton Wagler to continue to dissect pressure defense and lead a comfortable win.
In the second round, UCF represents a team that has a very strong resume, with wins over Kansas, Texas A&M and Texas Tech, but does not pass the metrics test, with a KenPom and T-Rank more befitting of an 11-seed.
Generally, this is another attractive-looking draw for the Illini. As a two-seed of the teams currently in the mix for a 3-seed Illinois could get placed across (Gonzaga, Vanderbilt, Kansas, Florida), Vanderbilt is the easy choice of which team I would feel most confident against. Saint Louis and Miami could also come out of that quarter of the bracket, as the bracket Gods (AKA me) put perhaps the best two mid-major conference teams (not counting Gonzaga or the Mountain West) against each other immediately.
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A month ago, when I first had the Illini opposite UConn, I mentioned a dread of having to play this team again. That dread is gone, as UConn has been clearly the weakest of the 1-seeds since the calendar turned to 2026, and Illinois has become a different team from the one who lost to the Huskies in Madison Square Garden. The run to the Final Four could follow a similar script to the 2005 team that is the last Illini Final Four team; get revenge on the team that knocked the Illini out in their previous Elite Eight appearance (Arizona in 2001 before the epic 2005 rematch).
First Four Out: Cal, Ohio State, Seton Hall, George Mason
Next Four Out: VCU, Virginia Tech, Oklahoma State, Mizzou
Bids By Conference
Big Ten: 10
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SEC: 10
ACC: 8
Big 12: 7
Big East: 3
Mountain West: 3
West Coast: 3
