The prohibitive favorite is Gonzaga who cruised to a perfect regular season. This isn’t hyperbole when I say cruised. They won every league game by double digits, scoring 80 points or more in 12 of 16 games. I don’t care the league or opponents, that’s domination.
The 2-seed is St. Mary’s. The Gaels finished 11-5 in league play losing by 48 and 15 to the Zags. They put together a better non-conference schedule and are 34th in KenPom but don’t have any great wins. It doesn’t help California was so bad this year, either. They mostly avoided bad losses though losses to Harvard and Western Kentucky are, eh, same with losing to Pepperdine. They have to make the tournament final.
The 3-seed is BYU who has two losses to sub-200 KenPom teams on their resume. It’s win or hope for the NIT. The 4-seed is San Francisco who looked worthy of a bid about 6 weeks ago but finished 4-6 in their last ten and have lost 3 in a row. They’re 43rd in KenPom but it’s win or bust in Vegas for the Dons.
The Pick: Gonzaga - My gut tells me St. Mary’s steals this as the Zags may throttle back a bit to prepare for the Big Dance but man, that resume is impressive. FWIW, the games leading into playing Gonzaga should be pretty fun and worth a late night watch.
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