We hear it all the time. You want to be playing your best ball going into the NCAA Tournament, but is that really true?
Since the NCAA Tournament expanded to 68 teams in 2011, think of all the teams who entered the big dance playing really good basketball. Purdue last year won six of seven games to earn a number one seed. Then they suffered a fairly ridiculous First Round loss to No. 16 Fairleigh Dickinson. Iowa won four games in four days to win the Big 10 Tournament in 2022. Then they lost in the First Round to Richmond. Arizona in 2018 won eight of nine heading into the big dance, then they lost in the First Round to Buffalo. Michigan State won nine straight entering the Big Dance in 2016, won the Big Ten Tournament and climbed to No. 2 in the country, then they were controversially only given a two seed and lost their first game to Middle Tennessee. Busting most of America’s brackets. Florida State in 2012 won five straight, including wins over Duke AND North Carolina in the ACC Tournament. I think all you Bearcats fans know how that turned out.
Okay, but here’s my point. Sometimes playing your best ball heading into the big dance doesn’t mean you’re going to make a run at the Final Four. I have come to realize that March Madness is truly a one-game season. And in that one game, anything can happen. It’s about taking it one game at a time, improving each game and the team that plays the best on a particular night is the one that will win.
You know what else is a one-game season? The Big 12 Conference. Every. Single. Game. It’s every team’s biggest game of the year and is, essentially, an NCAA Tournament game. For the Bearcats, that is massive experience in building their NCAA Tournament resume.
The Bearcats are in the process of building their NCAA Tournament resume, but there are also areas of improvement for this team. That, though, is a great position to be in when you’re still finding ways to win games and build your resume.
We know the Bearcats need to get better at three areas in particular: free throw shooting, lay-ups and three-point shooting. But despite those being Achilles heels for this Bearcats team, they are still finding ways to win games. Through four games in the gauntlet of the Big 12, the Bearcats, in their first year in the Big 12, are still finding their footing… AND finding ways to win games and be at 2-2 four games in.
And now, sitting at .500 through four conference games, we can start talking about things we haven’t gotten to talk about in four years. We know this team is going to, hopefully, get better. But they’ve done enough so far to warrant conversations about March Madness and their chances of making the Big Dance.
In fact, let’s start predicting the future. At 2-2, let’s look at the next 14 games of conference play and where that could put the Bearcats at come the end of the regular season.
vs. Oklahoma (W), @ Kansas (L), vs. UCF (W), @ West Virginia (W), @ Texas Tech (L), vs. Houston (L), vs. Iowa State (W), @ UCF (W), vs. Oklahoma State (W), @ TCU (L), @ Houston (L), vs. Kansas State (W), @ Oklahoma (L), vs. West Virginia (W)
My prediction would put the Bearcats at 21-10 overall and 10-8 in Big 12 play. Over the last 11 seasons, there have been multiple teams that went 10-8 in Big 12 play that garnered a top four seed in the Big 12 Tournament. But those 10-8 teams have more so been around the 5-seed line, which would still constitute a first round bye.
The Big 12 is going to give the Bearcats plenty of opportunities to earn resume-building wins while also improving as a team throughout the season. Setting themselves up well in the Big 12 Tournament is also crucial towards getting into the big dance, and a 10-8 conference record should do that. What the Bearcats have done so far has given them the opportunity to get to that mark of a good seed in the Big 12 Tournament with that record. The Bearcats may not be there in some areas, but they’re still finding ways to win games. Imagine if they get better in those areas of weakness. This team may actually be a team that can go who knows how far. It’s nice to be having conversations about that again during college basketball season.
I would add reducing turnovers.