Auburn earned the No. 1 overall NCAA Tournament seed. Its prize? A path full of landmines to reach the Final Four.
Louisville and Michigan are under-seeded March Madness teams lurking in Auburn’s region.
Bruce Pearl downplayed Auburn’s region draw, and he’s not concerned by his team losing three of its last four games within a rugged SEC.
The NCAA men’s tournament selection committee must have taken inspiration from the folks at the College Football Playoff when drawing up Auburn’s region in March Madness.
The committee awarded Bruce Pearl’s Tigers the No. 1 overall seed but stuck them in a South Region loaded with trip wires.
Auburn’s treacherous path to the Final Four reminds me of Oregon football’s draw as the No. 1 seed in the CFP bracket. The Ducks’ prize for an undefeated regular season became a prison of the committee’s making: a quarterfinal matchup with Ohio State, the nation’s most-talented team. The Buckeyes built the best résumé among at-large qualifiers, but the committee overlooked that during seeding. Oregon narrowly beat Ohio State during the regular season but got smashed in the playoff rematch.
Although no one in Auburn’s region presents as the basketball equivalent to Ohio State football, there’s nothing easy about this region. To the contrary, I consider this the tournament’s toughest. The committee would seem to agree.
After seeding snub, Louisville may be early test for Auburn
The committee’s true seeding revealed it considers Louisville the best No. 8 seed and Creighton the top No. 9 seed. Auburn would play one of those teams in the second round.
Multiple bracket experts had projected Louisville to be a No. 6 seed.
‘It hurt a little bit,’ Louisville coach Pat Kelsey said on ESPN Radio, when asked about his team’s seeding. ‘You felt slighted a little bit.’
The committee’s selection of North Carolina as the last team in received outsized attention, but the much bigger – and potentially consequential – whiff was the committee’s under-seeding of Louisville and No. 5 Michigan, then shoving both into Auburn’s bracket.
That potential second-round matchup with Louisville would occur at Rupp Arena in Lexington, Kentucky, less than 80 miles from Louisville’s campus.
Pearl shrugged off the notion that his team could be at a disadvantage facing Louisville in Lexington, but he admitted he didn’t expect to see Louisville as a No. 8 seed.
“Most of the stuff we had seen had (Louisville) on the 6- or 7-line,” Pearl said. “Somehow, they got bumped down to 8.
“Auburn travels,” he added. “We’re going to travel. We’re going to have a lot of people up in Lexington.”
Advance to the Sweet 16, and Auburn could meet either Texas A&M or Michigan. The committee ranks those teams as the best Nos. 4 and 5 seeds, respectively.
Auburn’s region also includes the Big Ten’s regular-season champion, No. 2 Michigan State, and its tournament champion, Michigan. The Big Ten graded as the nation’s second-best conference and qualified eight teams.
In other words, to reach the Final Four, the Tigers must play hopscotch across a field of landmines.
REGIONAL PREDICTIONS: East | West | Midwest | South
Bruce Pearl not worried by Auburn losses before March Madness
Pearl lands on my Mount Rushmore of active coaches who’ve never won a national championship. This marks his first time coaching a No. 1-seeded team, and it’s Auburn’s first time ever earning a top seed.
Pearl produced his best March Madness performances as an underdog. His Tigers reached the Final Four for the first time in program history in 2019 as a No. 5 seed.
He reached the Elite Eight in 2010 coaching Tennessee, as a No. 6 seed. And his 2005 Wisconsin-Milwaukee squad reached the Sweet 16 as a No. 12 seed by upsetting Alabama and Boston College.
“These would be the highest goals, I think, I’ve ever had heading into the NCAA Tournament,” Pearl said. “I’m more of a 12-seed guy, in my whole career, than I am a 1-seed.”
Auburn operated as the nation’s best team for most of the season, fueled by indefatigable big man Johni Broome, before losing three of its last four games.
Duke, Houston and Florida earned the other No. 1 seeds. Each won a conference tournament championship. Duke and Houston also won regular-season conference crowns. Each of those three teams built a case for being the No. 1 overall seed, but the committee chose Auburn after the Tigers led the nation with 16 “Quad 1” victories.
Pearl, after Auburn’s loss to Tennessee in the SEC Tournament semifinals, downplayed his team’s three recent losses against SEC opponents, all of which are seeded No. 4 or better in the NCAA Tournament.
“Yeah, we’re panicked,” Pearl said in a tone thick with sarcasm, before shaking his head in apparent annoyance at a reporter’s question about Auburn losing three of its last four.
If he’s annoyed by Auburn’s draw in the NCAA bracket, he’s not showing it.
“Our goal is to win the national championship,” Pearl said. “If we don’t win a national championship, we’ll be disappointed, as a No. 1 seed.”
Blake Toppmeyer is a columnist for the USA TODAY Network. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on X @btoppmeyer. Subscribe to read all of his columns.