Paraball’s March Madness Bracket
Photo Credit: Abbie Parr/Associated Press
The brackets are in and one of the most exciting weeks of sports is about to begin! This year’s March Madness tournament features top seeded UConn, looking to defend its title and become the eighth program to repeat as national champions—the first to do so since Florida in 2007. The bracket also features some potential Cinderella teams that have had tremendous seasons in weaker conferences. Who will come out on top?
In this analysis, I’ll go through each of the 6118 games in the 2023-24 men’s college basketball season that featured at least one Division I school, and use a modified ELO algorithm to rank the teams heading into the big dance. Instead of the traditional ELO, which assigns a game win share of 1.0 to the winning team and a game win share of 0 to the losing team, the modified ELO allows me to take into account the point differential in each game as well as address games that go to overtime.
Figure 1 below illustrates how I divided the win share between the two teams in each matchup, using the game’s point differential.
Figure 1: Win Share versus Win Margin
For example, winning a game by just one point results in a win share of 0.6, winning by 10 points results in a win share of 0.88, and winning by 20 points results in a win share of 0.97. Winning a game in overtime, regardless of the final score, results in a win share of 0.55.
Table 2 lists the modified ELO ratings of the top 20 teams that qualified for the tournament.
Table 1: Modified ELO ratings of the top 20 teams in the NCAA Men’s Tournament.
UConn, Houston, and Purdue have the top three spots according to modified ELO—each of these teams is also a number one seed. UNC, however, the fourth number one seed, is rated eighth by modified ELO, with Iowa State, Auburn, McNeese State, and Saint Mary’s ahead of them.
Below are Paraball’s picks to win each region, starting with the East and followed by the West, South, and Midwest regions.
Picks for the East
Figure 2: Paraball’s Picks for the East Region, along with win probability for each matchup.
UConn is the favorite to win the East, but not without a difficult potential matchup against Auburn in the Sweet 16 and the very tough potential matchup against Iowa State in the Elite 8. The likely upsets in the East are 11-seed Duquesne beating 6-seed BYU and 10-seed Drake beating 7-seed Washington State. Overall, UConn has a 31% chance to advance to the Final Four.
Picks for the West
Figure 3: Paraball’s Picks for the West Region, along with win probability for each matchup.
The West is loaded with potential upsets. They include 13-seed College of Charleston beating 4-seed Alabama, 11-seed New Mexico beating 6-seed Clemson, 10-seed Nevada beating 7-seed Dayton, 11-seed New Mexico beating 3-seed Baylor, 10-seed Nevada beating 2-seed Arizona, and finally 5-seed Saint Mary’s upsetting 1-seed North Carolina. Given the parity of the teams in the West, Saint Mary’s only has an 11% chance to advance to the Final Four.
Picks for the South
Figure 4: Paraball’s Picks for the South Region, along with win probability for each matchup.
Houston has the easiest quarter of all the number one seeds, with their toughest potential matchup against 12-seed James Madison. The upsets in South are 12-seed James Madison beating 5-seed Wisconsin, 12-seed James Madison beating 4-seed Duke, and 3-seed Kentucky beating 2-seed Marquette. Houston has a 38% chance to advance to the Final Four.
Picks for the Midwest
Figure 5: Paraball’s Picks for the Midwest Region, along with win probability for each matchup.
Purdue has two potential difficult matchups in the Midwest: a Sweet 16 date with McNeese State figures to be a tight game and the potential Elite 8 matchup with Tennessee could be a struggle. The upsets in the Midwest are 12-seed McNeese beating 5-seed Gonzaga and 13-seed Samford beating 4-seed Kansas.
Picks for the Final Four and the Finals
Below are my picks for the Final Four and the Finals.
Figure 6: Paraball’s Picks for the Final Four and Finals, along with win probability for each matchup.
UConn beats 2024’s Cinderella team Saint Mary’s in the Final Four, while Houston edges past fellow number one seed Purdue. UConn then completes their quest for back-to-back titles and takes down Houston in the Finals. Overall, UConn has a 13% chance to win the title, while Houston has a 9% chance.
