Men’s Bracketology 12/23/2024

It is difficult to overstate the level of dominance the SEC has shown so far this season. Not only does the SEC have 13 of its 16 teams in this bracket, but it has two teams each as 1, 2, 3 and 4 seeds. Even in the heyday of the old Big East, a conference has never had eight teams as protected seeds.

One disappointing feature of this year’s bracket is that it looks like it will be heavy on power conference teams. Normally you can count on the Mountain West, WCC or A10 to produce a fair number of tournament teams between them. All three leagues look a bit light this year, I project only two at-larges between those leagues right now.

We also look a bit light on mid-major at-large candidates this year. Drake is our best bet- the Bulldogs got a surprising at-large in 2021 and are off to an 11-0 start.

I’ll be updating my men’s bracketology at least weekly through the end of January and start more frequent updates once we get into February.

Bids by Conference:

SEC: 13

Big 10: 10

Big 12: 9

ACC: 5

Big East: 2

West Coast: 2

Mountain West: 2