The NCAA Tournament for 2014 is starting this week and the Match Madness Bracket has all the college basketball game dates listed for each seeded matchup and at the bottom here is a link to ESPN with their expert picks and predictions for the national title and this year the top overall seeds are the Florida Gators, Wichita State Shockers, Arizona Wildcats and Virginia Cavaliers.
There has been some controversy as there always is over some of the selections and teams like Louisville and Michigan State have some beef with the committee after they were made number four seeds despite winning their conference tournaments. The Spartans won over Michigan in the Big Ten after the Wolverines won the regular season title, while the Cardinals were likely hurt due to the fact that the American Athletic Conference is not considered as strong as the other ones.
SMU was left out of things this season and the Cardinals come in after winning 12 of 13 games and the AAC title and Louisville of course are the defending champions after winning the title last season. The final top 10 of the season has Florida at the top and the gators are ahead of Wichita State after they completed and undefeated season and they are ahead of Virginia, who won their first tournament title in the ACC in over 20 years and they have been as impressive as anyone, ranking first in the nation in points allowed per game this season. The rest of the top 10 for the AP poll was finished out with Arizona, Louisville, Villanova, Michigan, Duke, Iowa State and Kansas.
The South region this year has the number one overall seed in Florida and they completed an undefeated season in the SEC after winning over Kentucky in the championship game of the tournament and now they will play against either Albany or Mount St. Mary's after the first play-in game is decided. The team will be favorites in their region, but they have Syracuse as a number three and Kansas as a two, while UCLA will play against Tulsa and the first game for the Orange will be against Western Michigan and that could be an upset to watch if Cuse is still reeling from their defeat against NC State in the ACC tournament. The rest of the matchup's in the region has Ohio State and Dayton, while New Mexico plays Stanford and Kansas takes on Eastern Kentucky, while VCU plays against SF Austin and Colorado takes on Pitt in the eight nine game.
Arizona remained a number one seed despite the fact that they lost to UCLA in the Pac-12 tournament and in their west region, the team plays against Weber State to start the tournament, while Wisconsin is playing against American. That region also has Baylor and Nebraska playing, while Creighton takes on Louisiana and Oregon plays against BYU. Wichita State has a stacked region in the Midwest and many are happy about that, as the Shockers come from a weak conference and everyone wants them tested before making a run since they are undefeated.
The team matches up against Cal Poly or Texas Southern in their first game, while Kentucky and Kansas State will be going at it as well. Louisville faces off with Manhattan, while Duke has Mercer and the Blue Devils will be looking to make a nice run, while Michigan faces off with Wofford to start things off.
Check here for ESPN expert picks from names like Jay Bilas and Andy Katz and check here for a full bracket and schedule for the upcoming NCAA tournament and the first and second round games.