Wow. Wow. Wow. A day like Friday requires a running diary:

11:40am ET: I’m reading various web blogs. The best comment: Thursday was March Monotony. We desperately need a better day of basketball.

12:10pm ET: The day tips off with #11 Texas vs #6 Cincinnati. If you had asked me to write a script for Texas vs Cincinnati based on what happened during the regular season, here is what I would have written. Cincinnati’s ball pressure will shock the Texas guards, the Texas freshmen will turn it over and fall behind. Eventually, because Texas has an efficient offense, the Longhorns will get back in the game. But since they’ve failed in almost every close game against a good team this year, Texas will come up short. The game followed the script almost perfectly.

1:00pm ET: I’m watching San Diego St. and NC State and wondering if anyone honestly believes SDSU is the favored team here. Yes the Aztecs beat California and Arizona early in the year. But by now we know that beating the Pac-12 was rather uninformative. Cal was crushed by USF in the First Four and Arizona fell to Bucknell in the NIT. If NC State wins, it won’t be an upset.

2:25pm ET: Last summer I was on the “free Richard Howell” bandwagon. Despite the fact that NC State was terrible at rebounding, and despite the fact that Howell was the best rebounder on the team, Sidney Lowe refused to play him. Thankfully Mark Gottfried discovered Howell’s talents, and the big man rewarded him by scoring 22 points on 10 of 12 shooting in his first NCAA tournament game. But a funny thing happened in this game. Even though Howell played well, NC State went on a run and broke the game open when Howell went to the bench with his 4^th foul. Can a player be the star of the game if he isn’t on the floor for the game-deciding run?

3:25pm ET: Alabama has the ball down 1 in the final seconds against Creighton. I have all sorts of thoughts running through my head. Alabama’s offense has been horrible all year. Creighton’s defense has been horrible all year. Who will win? But the end-game sequence is butchered by some bizarre timeouts, and Alabama doesn’t even get a clean look at the basket.

3:29pm ET: I’m sick of that logistics commercial about the Duke/Kentucky pass. In fact, I’m sick of all the logistics commercials.

3:30pm ET: I am not shocked Virginia lost. When Assane Sene was declared ineligible by Tony Bennett, the season was over. I am shocked that Mike Davis was fired by UAB. He may have only made the NCAA tournament once, but he had UAB in the top 3 of CUSA on numerous occasions.

3:45pm ET: Andrew Nicholson is playing like the best player on the floor and St. Bonaventure has an early lead on Florida St. How many people have Florida St. going to the Final Four?

4:05pm ET: Remember when Florida played Kentucky during the regular season, and the Gators could barely get their three point shots off cleanly, let alone make those shots? Well, that was Belmont vs Georgetown. Belmont was a trendy upset pick based on their great perimeter shooting, but with Georgetown often fielding a lineup with four player 6’8” or taller, Belmont had multiple times when they couldn’t even get a clean look. Belmont was smart enough to keep passing, and they sometimes got clean looks in the chaos. But more often than not the extra passes led to a Belmont turnover. Belmont eventually settled into cross-court passes to try to get open threes, but Greg Whittington even blocked one of those threes late in the game. It turns out the way you stop a great three point shooting team is with size. Who knew it was that simple?

Offensively, Georgetown broke the game open with some nice backdoor cuts on passes from Nate Lubick in the post. For some reason, Belmont’s defensive scheme allowed Georgetown to feed its post players at will. Obviously Belmont was not afraid of Lubick beating them one-on-one, but when you allow a team to work inside-out, the offense almost always wins.

5:55pm ET: Crud, Florida St. just held off St. Bonaventure and again the losing team can’t get off a decent shot at the end.  Today has been better, but it isn’t quite memorable yet.

6:20pm ET: Well, Norfolk St. is hanging tough with Missouri so at least I can watch that. I’ve shown splits at various times this year and the pattern is clear. Missouri plays to the level of their competition. They’ve played fantastic basketball against elite teams, and played “just good enough” against mediocre teams. But this feels like a fluke. Missouri is going to pull away late.

6:35pm ET: I’m starting to think Norfolk St. has a real chance to win when they hit a three to take a four point lead in the final four minutes. Then Marcus Denmon takes an utterly mind-boggling turnaround three pointer. Where did that shot come from? Now I’m really starting to think Norfolk St. has a chance.

6:45pm ET: Kyle O’Quinn tips the ball up in the air on a FT miss, and eventually ties up a Missouri player, giving Norfolk St. the possession arrow. The ball was hopping up in the air so long, I was wondering if time might expire on a FT miss.

6:50pm ET: Missouri is down two in the final seconds. St. John’s ran a play earlier this year against Cincinnati that allowed them to score a floater in the lane in less than 2 seconds. Missouri runs essentially the same play, but they start it further from the basket, and Phil Pressey puts up a three pointer.

6:51pm ET: The Missouri mascot covers his eyes on the sidelines. The shot misses. Norfolk St. wins. A 15-seed has defeated a 2-seed.

6:55pm ET: Kyle O’Quinn, “If it wasn’t for the scholarship offer from Norfolk St., I don’t know where I would be today. I had to pay those coaches back.”

7:00pm ET: Greg Gumbel tries to introduce the evening’s slate of games on CBS. The rest of the crew treats him like he is Perd Hapley from NBC’s Parks and Recreation. “You want to talk about the upcoming games?! Don't you want to talk about Missouri losing to Norfolk St?” Gumbel, “So is Duke going to beat Lehigh?” Greg Anthony, “No, Duke isn’t going to beat Lehigh…”

7:02pm ET: Charles Barkley, “That interview that Kyle O’Quinn gave was fantastic. That is what college basketball is all about.”

7:10pm ET: My mom calls.  “Thank goodness Florida St. came back to win.  I have them going to the Final Four.” Me, “Did you see Missouri lost?”  Her, “No!!!!!”

7:30pm ET: In one of the pregame shows, Seth Davis was asked about picking South Dakota St. and Belmont to pull upsets this week. Davis is shown with a SDSU wall-sticker and a Belmont wall-sticker. Davis, “Why don’t you show the video where I picked Norfolk St. to win?” Others, “Because it doesn’t exist."

8:35pm ET: Duke leads by 2 points at half-time, but there is something wrong with the net and they are restringing it on one end of the court. Mike Krzyzewski has this extremely painful expression on his face. The last thing he wants to do is stand here any longer with Lehigh within two points.

8:40pm ET: Four games are coming down to the wire simultaneously. My ability to process information is now seriously curtailed. Tarik Black fouls out for Memphis. That looks like it is going to hurt. If you’ve followed Memphis this year, you know they don’t have a lot of depth inside, and they just aren’t the same team with Black on the bench.

8:45pm ET: Duke’s Seth Curry gets called for an intentional foul after turning the ball over. It looked to me like he made a legitimate play on the ball. This is not Duke’s day.

9:10pm ET: St. Louis’ Kwamain Mitchell is on fire. And St. Louis holds off Memphis.

9:35pm ET: Two years after DJ Cooper led Ohio to an upset over Georgetown, he is doing it again. But this time Ohio runs into a scoring drought late in the game. Michigan is down three points and gets at least four attempts at a game-tying three. A week ago against Minnesota, John Beilein drew up a play that got Evan Smotrycz a wide-open three from deep that tied the game and sent it into OT. This time Beilein doesn’t call timeout and he lets his players try to win it on their own. Trey Burke gets a switch and is matched up with an Ohio forward. Burke is trying desperately to dribble into the lane, but he can’t get passed the defender. Ohio holds on for the upset.

9:35pm ET: Lehigh beats full court pressure for a wide open lay-up and 7 point lead. Is it possible, is a second 2-seed going to fall today?

9:45pm ET: Despite pulling within 3 points with 1 second left, Duke falls. Jim Nance is in shock. Every year he gets assigned to the equivalent of the Greensboro regional and has to sit through Duke and North Carolina winning easily in the first round. This year Duke fell. Of course, most college basketball experts believed Duke was going to lose early in the tournament. But it is still shocking to see it happen this early.

9:50pm ET: St. Mary’s has come back from 11 points down to take the lead on Purdue. Purdue has been a team that has blown leads this year. Purdue held a big lead against Xavier and lost. They held a big lead against Butler and lost. So Boilermaker fans have to be pulling their hair out.

Purdue is down one with a chance to take the lead, but they turn it over. Then the Gaels get called for a travel on the baseline. (You can only run the baseline after made baskets.) Lewis Jackson draws a foul and heads to the line with a chance to re-take the lead. Two years ago Jackson was a 44% free throw shooter, but he’s improved and he makes both free throws when it matters most. St. Mary’s airballs a three pointer and within moments, Purdue has won the game.

10pm ET: My brain is in shock. This is why people love the NCAA tournament.

11:30pm ET: South Florida is going to upset Temple thanks to another crazy defensive effort, but at this point the 12-5 upset doesn’t register with me. But I do notice that North Carolina’s road to the Elite Eight is looking very easy.

12:15am ET: Tu Holloway drives the lane and hits a fade-away jumper to give Xavier a late lead. But moments later, Notre Dame was at the line with a one-and-one and a chance to tie the game. And just one day after the NCAA clarified the rule about lane violations, it happens again. One of the Notre Dame guards starts towards the basket before the ball hit the rim, and the refs call the lane violation. The ball (and game) is awarded to Xavier.

12:16pm ET: Scott Martin is shown on the sideline holding back tears. I have to say, the video production teams are all over the crying players this year. I have seen at least 15 shots of players with towels on their heads or their jerseys over their face, and it is only Day 2.

Wow.

Expected Wins (Excluding Opening Round)

Own: If you lose, your expected wins go to zero.  If you win, your expected wins go up.

Other: Other team’s outcomes can also impact your expected wins.

Marg: The margin of victory for all tournament teams can impact your expected wins. This essentially reflects the daily change in the Pomeroy Rankings.

Obviously the losses by Duke and Missouri freed up a lot of wins for other teams in the field.

Lehigh, Norfolk St., and Ohio significantly improved their expected number of wins by advancing. Michigan St.’s win was mostly expected, so they did not improve their expectation much based on their “Own” win.

But the “Other” results helped.  Michigan St., Marquette, and Florida, all saw a big jump in their expectation based on Missouri’s loss.  And Baylor and Xavier benefited from Duke’s loss, but Duke wasn’t a terribly strong team this year, so that effect is smaller.

Florida’s huge margin-of-victory was a net benefit for the Gators, and it also helped Kentucky’s profile even though the Wildcats did not play.  As a result, Kentucky is once again the tournament favorite.

Because of the fast pace of both teams, BYU versus Iona has the potential to be one of the most entertaining First Four games of all-time. Also, I am salivating at seeing Missouri’s guards and Florida’s guards potentially clashing in the round of 32. But before I start breaking down the bracket, let’s throw a few quick stats at the wall:

Which Conferences Did the Best?

One thing I like to track during the NCAA tournament is whether conferences are exceeding expectations or falling short. One way to do that is to look at how seeds have performed from 1985 to 2011 and predict an expected number of wins for each conference.

(Note: In all tables I am only counting wins in the Round of 64 and beyond.)

Based on these seed expectations and the seeds received, the Big East should win the most games in the tournament, but the Big Ten is expected to win nearly as many games with three fewer teams.

We can also use this year’s margin-of-victory numbers to form an expectation. In the next table I use Ken Pomeroy’s predicted probabilities. Here we get a slightly different picture. His model expects the Big Ten to win the most games in the tournament, with the ACC earning far fewer wins than their high seeds would indicate:

Team-By-Team

2012 is the year of the clear favorite. It will be virtually impossible for any of the experts who follow college basketball not to pick Kentucky to win the national championship. In terms of the measured statistics like margin-of-victory, in terms of the NBA ready talent on the floor, in terms of 34 games on TV over four months, no one has come close to the Wildcats this season.

But more importantly, there are no clear alternatives to the Wildcats. Again using Ken Pomeroy’s formula, here are the expected wins for each team in the tournament this year:

Rather than showing one clear alternative, the numbers show a great deal of balance between the top seeds.

The Right Side of the Bracket (East and Midwest)

The margin-of-victory crowd is going to love Ohio St., but they might be the only ones. Despite bringing back one of the top post players in the country in Jared Sullinger, one of the top defenders in Aaron Craft, one of the most prolific two-guards in William Buford, and watching Deshaun Thomas emerge into a versatile scoring threat, Ohio St.’s offense has struggled at times this year. Ohio St. has simply not been able to replace the outside shooting of Jon Diebler. And by sharing the Big Ten title and falling to Michigan St. in the conference tournament, very few people are going to be in love with this team. Add in a potential Sweet Sixteen match-up with a Florida St. team that has two wins against Duke and two wins against North Carolina, and Ohio St. will get far less love than these numbers would suggest.

Syracuse is the more traditional favorite, but they are the worst defensive rebounding team in the field, and their offense can look stagnant when they aren’t forcing turnovers. Even a second round match-up against Kansas St. could be a nightmare for Syracuse. Kansas St.’s team is built to crash the glass, and if Angel Rodriguez can simply throw up jump shots (instead of turning the ball over at his normally high rate), Kansas St. might have a chance for an upset.

North Carolina is the choice for people who like NBA talent, but the ACC was so weak this year, the Tar Heels didn’t get their normal share of big games. And when they did play quality teams, they would usually be close. UNC would win 54-51 against Virginia or 69-67 against NC State. Certainly everyone says North Carolina has a lot of NBA ready talent on paper, but unlike Kentucky, it never felt like North Carolina was unbeatable. Ever since the big win over Michigan St. on an aircraft carrier to start the season, they rarely gave off that aura of invincibility. And with John Henson’s injury this weekend, there are additional doubts about the Tar Heels.

If you are scared away by Kentucky’s inexperience, you might like Kansas. The Jayhawks don’t have any amazing freshmen this year because the majority of their recruiting class was declared academically ineligible to start the season. That has left Kansas with a veteran lineup and Bill Self has clearly got the most out of every player on the floor. The once ridiculed Tyshawn Taylor has emerged as a polished superstar and Thomas Robinson emerged into quite possibly the best player in the country.

But when you look at this group of four teams (Syracuse, Ohio St., North Carolina, and Kansas) any honest evaluation would say that it truly is a toss-up. I would unquestionably pick these four teams for the regional finals on that half of the bracket, but I have no idea which of these teams will play in the national title game.

The Left Side of the Bracket (West)

On the other side of the bracket, it is hard not to love what Michigan St. has accomplished this year. But the Spartans got the worst possible second round draw. Memphis has been absolutely demolishing teams lately, winning their last seven games by 18 points or more. Michigan St. may be able to exploit Memphis’ lack of size in the paint better than any team in the nation, but they shouldn’t have to face such a dominant team in the second round. (Oh, and if St. Louis upsets Memphis, they have elite margin-of-victory numbers too.) So even if Michigan St. was a reasonable pick for a deep run based on their performance in the toughest conference in the country this year, the bracket makes the Spartans a very risky bet.

Instead many people will be drawn to the sentimental favorite Missouri. Don’t pick against the Tigers because of their lack of depth. They’ve played smart and avoided foul trouble all year. Don’t pick against the Tigers because of their lack of size. They’ve played bigger teams all year, and they’ve actually struggled more against smaller quicker teams. In fact, I would argue that picking against Missouri is the most unpleasant thing you could possibly do this year. With only 7 scholarship players, this group has developed a type of offensive chemistry that will help you rediscover a love for basketball.

I think part of what made the Missouri offense so good this year was the change of pace. Normally when a player goes to the NBA they realize that the game is much faster. But eventually the game slows down. Well, Missouri is having a slow-down moment. While Missouri still plays at an exceedingly fast-pace relative to most teams, it is much slower than what they played under Mike Anderson. Somehow the game is very calm and controlled for them, while remaining at a fever pitch for opponents.

Ricardo Ratliffe is the perfect example. Teams know that he shoots nearly 70% in the paint so they cannot afford to let him get paint touches, but somehow the Missouri guards are always cutting and using screens and finding a way to get him the ball in scoring position. And Ratliffe probably has the quickest release of any post player in college today. He rarely holds the ball and lets the defense react. He catches the ball and gets it up on the backboard immediately

Having said all that, I’m not in love with Missouri’s draw. Let me get to that:

First, I really like Florida over Virginia. A number of the experts say that Virginia likes to play a pack-line defense and force teams to shoot over the top. Well, Florida is not afraid to shoot over the top. But I actually think that is a little over-rated. Virginia has played the pack-line defense, but still been quick enough to get out on shooters. What concerns me more than anything is how poorly Virginia has played since Assane Sene has gone down. The defense just hasn’t been the same without the 7 footer in the middle, and he is not going to be back for the tournament.

And if Florida advances to face Missouri, that’s a dream match-up on paper. While Missouri has succeeded by playing four guards around Ricardo Ratliffe, that will allow Florida to play four guards around Patric Young. And while Kentucky has almost single-handedly convinced the country that Florida isn’t very good, realistically Florida is almost the mirror-image of Missouri. Missouri might be the favorite, but that game would be very close to a toss-up.

And if Missouri faces Marquette in the Sweet Sixteen, Marquette is another team that has the quickness to stay with Missouri. Plus Buzz Williams clearly takes his scouting to another level in the NCAA tournament. Facing his team after a four day break would be a nightmare.

The Left Side of the Bracket (South)

Duke drew the short straw getting placed in the same region as Kentucky. And the Blue Devils were also clearly the least dominant of the 1 and 2 seeds during the regular season. Give Mike Krzyzewski credit for putting together the right non-conference schedule that got Duke the quality wins they need to be a 2-seed, but even the usually Duke-loving Dick Vitale has said that this is not a vintage Duke team. When Vitale says the Blue Devils might lose in the second round of the tournament, you know they have flaws. Now is probably a good time for me to show another Expected Win chart:

Baylor will be the clear pick to upset Duke for some people based on the large amount of NBA talent on their roster. But as an NBA-centered team, they remind me a lot of recent Texas teams under Rick Barnes. Somehow showing off their game for NBA scouts is more important than winning. Baylor proved some skeptics wrong by beating Kansas in the Big 12 tournament, but if Missouri will make you love college basketball, cheering for Baylor will absolutely drive you nuts. You almost have to beg for Perry Jones III to get a post touch, and while Brady Heslip is a great sharp-shooter, he doesn’t seem to have any feel for when to take threes and when to work the offense.

Dark Horses

- I’ve already written at length about how Wisconsin’s numbers are inflated based on crushing a bunch of small teams early in the season. But I do believe the Badgers are dangerous. My main concern with picking them is that at their slow pace, they open up the door to losing any game. Montana is clearly not in Wisconsin’s league, but in a 58 possession game, against a solid Montana defense, the game will probably be close.

- Wichita St. is the most dominant MVC team since Ken Pomeroy began tracking stats, and they have the kind of 7-foot center in Garrett Stutz that a lot of mid-major teams do not. That is why Seth Davis was professing his love for this team on CBS.

- Vanderbilt absolutely has the talent at every position to beat any team in the country. And they should long savor their win over Kentucky in the SEC final. But the main complaint is that the Commodores have failed to play well against weaker teams. With basically the same lineup they’ve lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament in previous years, and they had many games this season where they struggled with weaker opponents. Sure, I’ll believe you if you say they can beat Syracuse. But can they even get to that game?

- Finally, Florida St. is the team that a lot of people are going to be picking based on the ACC tournament title. But again, they have a potential nightmare match-up if they face Cincinnati. The Bearcats are one of the best teams in the country at forcing steals and Florida St.’s biggest weakness is holding on to the ball. Sure, they might be able to beat Ohio St. But can they even get to that game?

Here are more expected wins in the round of 64 and beyond:

- In case it wasn’t clear how terrible the draw is for Memphis and St. Louis. Memphis has the 9th best Pomeroy ranking, but is 22nd in expected wins. St. Louis had the 15th best Pomeroy ranking, but is 39th in expected wins.

- Southern Miss has some of the worst margin-of-victory stats in the field. Don’t pick them to upset Kansas St.

And here is the last of the list:

Parting Thoughts

- Seth Davis said it well at the end of the selection special, the NCAA committee sent a message that non-conference strength-of-schedule matters. That’s why Iona got in ahead of Drexel. And that’s why Missouri was not a #1 seed. A lot of people will argue with that message. What does non-conference strength-of-schedule have to do with evaluating the quality of a team? Isn’t the goal to pick the best teams? But I’ve been watching this show for 20 years, and the committee has always had this emphasis. They want to incentivize teams to play big games early in the season, and whether it is an explicit criteria or not, it is a criteria.

- I still can’t believe Kevin Harlan weaved in a comment about Peyton Manning during the Arizona vs Colorado Pac-12 final. (Yes, Manning probably won’t be choosing between Denver and Arizona based on the outcome of that game.)

- Finally, only Bob Knight could manage to eat an ice cream cone while calling a college basketball game.

The older I get, the more I see that one of the things I love most about sports is the variety of it, the diversity of it and the CHARACTERS. Men’s tennis is at its best in many years because, for the first time in a long time, the top three or four players all have wildly different styles. The Tim Tebow story was fun on so many levels, but one of those levels was that he was just SO DIFFERENT in how he played — I’d say we are entering a great time for quarterbacks, because Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers and Eli Manning and Drew Brees and Michael Vick and Cam Newton and Tebow and others are not really alike at all.

-- Joe Posnanski

As a basketball fan, I’ve never understood the division that exists between fans of the NBA and the NCAA. While the NBA has the best basketball players in the world, March Madness is compelling in its own right and as entertaining as anything that happens on the professional level.

In the NBA, the owners of the 30 franchises consider turning a profit and getting an equal shot at the top players a right, regardless of how well (or how poorly) they run their organization and the respective size of their fan-bases. Since every losing team is a few ping pong balls from the rights to a LeBron James, Kevin Durant or Dwight Howard, personnel determines scheme in the NBA.

In contrast, the vast majority of the 344 Division I programs in college basketball have little chance of ever receiving a commitment from a McDonald’s All-American. But instead of petulantly trying to sabotage the sport in a misguided effort to legislate fairness, schools try many creative ways of leveraging the talents of the players they can recruit. As a result, scheme determines personnel in the NCAA.

At Syracuse, Jim Boeheim has made a Hall of Fame career out of running a contrarian scheme, in his case an aggressive 2-3 zone. The Orange traditionally have rosters full of “1.5’s”, 6’3+ combo guards lacking the quickness to defend elite PG’s and the size to defend SG’s, and “3.5’s”, 6’8+ combo forwards lacking the quickness to defend elite SF’s and the size to defend PF’s. However, because Syracuse never plays man defense, the athletic deficiencies of their players are minimized.

So while nearly every NBA team runs a fairly similar system of isolations, pick-and-rolls and man defense, an incredibly diverse array of styles can be found in the college game. On one end of the spectrum, teams like Missouri play four guards and pressure the ball 94 feet for 48 minutes, on the other, teams like Wisconsin run a deliberate motion offense, trying to minimize the number of possessions and shoot at the very end of the shot-clock.

In the NBA, the players are too good for the “40 Minutes of Hell” system (which Mike Anderson has brought to Missouri and Arkansas in the last few years) to be successful. Like Mike Leach’s bizarre pass-happy offense in college football, Anderson’s system, which he learned as a member of Nolan Richardson’s staff in Arkansas in the 1990’s, has philosophical holes that professional athletes can exploit. Nevertheless, that doesn’t make them any less entertaining on the collegiate level.

And with 68 teams set to compete in the NCAA Tournament, there are a lot more surprises in the college game. Even programs ranked in the top-15 like Murray State have barely been on national TV this season.

We have a pretty good idea of how teams like the Pacers and the 76ers match up with the top of the Eastern Conference but not whether an undersized Murray State squad can handle the size of an elite team from a Power Six conference. It’s an open question how Isaiah Canaan’s speed and athleticism translates outside of the Ohio Valley Conference. Non-conference play in college basketball generally ends in late December, so it’s almost impossible to gauge how younger teams like Texas, Washington and Tennessee who have found their groove in the last two months will fare in March.

In the NBA, it’s hard to envision a scenario where Chicago, Miami and Oklahoma City aren’t three of the final four teams left in the playoffs. In the NCAA, as many as two dozen teams have a legitimate shot at making a run at the Final Four.

Of course, in terms of entertainment, none of this makes the NCAA necessarily better or worse than the NBA, just different. But, as Posnanski writes, there’s something to be said for the concept of “different” in the modern sports world. Basketball fans of all stripes should enjoy March Madness; the NBA will still be here in a few weeks.