clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

NCAA Bracket Predictions 2011: Should Richmond Be Your 12-5 Upset Pick?

Trying to predict the NCAA Tournament bracket is a bit of a fool's errand, so I'm going to try to help you out (as if I knew any better). I'm going to take a deeper look at the potential tournament matchups of each of the local teams and try to predict how far they will advance. Let's take a look at the Spiders of Richmond.

We all know about 12-5 matchups in the NCAA Tournament. Even though they are pretty far apart in the seeding, there is at least one every year. For some reason, the five seeds are never as strong as their seeding would indicate, and the 12 seeds are always stronger. Your bracket isn't complete until you pick at least one upset. Can Richmond be that team?

I believe they can. I don't have a ton of faith in Vanderbilt, and I'm not sure how they got seeded at five. It seems like they were an above average team in the SEC (which is not a terrific conference) all season long, and didn't have a spectacular win to speak of. A five seed would indicate that they are one of the top-20 teams in the Country, and if they are ranked there, I don't think that they are. So I actually like Richmond to advance here.

In the next round they would face the winner of Louisville and Morehead St., and I'm pretty sure that is going to be Louisville. Even though they are only one seed higher than Vanderbilt, I think they are the better team by a pretty large margin. If Richmond advances to the second round and the Cardinals are there waiting for them, I don't think they get any further.