Which teams do top NCAA Tournament contenders like Duke and Michigan want to avoid on Selection Sunday?

I get the same jitters on Selection Sunday as I did in high school ahead of the ACT. You get 19 weeks of ball-watching to prepare. You know the personnel. You know the strengths and weaknesses of these teams. The bracket reveal is the ultimate test because styles make fights and matchups are everything in March Madness.

Selection Sunday is 10 days away, and the test-prep is still humming in earnest in the closing hours. I just need a 29 — or a 1350 for the more cultured people who took the SAT — on this test.

Let’s dive into the matchups that some of the top contenders would not want to be blessed with by the selection committee, based on what we’ve learned about these clubs through the long regular season. 

Why Purdue could give Duke fits

Duke has become the No. 1 defense in America with a ton of NBA tenets. Duke’s gap help is fantastic. Duke’s off-ball defense is as good as you can find. Duke’s blend of skilled size and outstanding switching helps snuff out advantages, and now that Jon Scheyer has plugged up a once-leaky transition defense, there’s just no easy options to pick at.

To beat this team, you need an excellent offensive play-designer and a point guard who can problem-solve on the fly.

For all its warts, Purdue still has both of those things. Matt Painter and offensive coordinator P.J. Thompson have built a catalogue of set plays. Purdue’s deep playbook is on par with anybody, and point guard Braden Smith just shreds in pick-and-rolls with his patient barrage of skip passes, shot fakes and pocket passes.

Duke is so good at grinding every game into a halfcourt affair, but Purdue would welcome that. The Boilermakers’ halfcourt offense ranks 10th-best nationally in efficiency, per Synergy. Duke’s physicality has bothered so many teams this year, but Cameron Boozer and Patrick Ngongba aren’t big-dawging guys like Oscar Cluff and Trey Kaufman-Renn. 

The way Duke is playing these days is terrifying. It has won 17 of 18 for a reason. The way Purdue is playing these days is also terrifying … just for opposite reasons.

But with how Duke is constructed, seeing Purdue miles and miles away from its section of the bracket would be just what the doctor ordered.

The team that would expose Texas Tech’s weakness

Texas Tech is currently a No. 4 seed in CBS Sports bracketology. St. John’s is right on that cut-line between a No. 5 or No. 6 seed, so a potential second-round date is firmly in the range of potential outcomes.

Even without JT Toppin, Texas Tech can make the second weekend because Grant McCasland is a magician, this group is very connected and Christian Anderson is a superstar. But playing St. John’s in the Round of 32 would be a miserable draw. 

This diminished version of Texas Tech is vulnerable against high-end athleticism. St. John’s has that in spades with Dillon Mitchell and Zuby Ejiofor. 

Rick Pitino has a stable of guards that he would send at Anderson to try and wear him down with 94 feet of ball pressure for all 40 minutes. St. John’s would be overwhelming on the boards, and it wouldn’t be hard to envision a scenario where Texas Tech’s undermanned front-line of LeJuan Watts and Luke Bamgboye are both in foul trouble early in the second half after dealing with Ejiofor and Bryce Hopkins, two of the elite foul-drawing forwards in all of college basketball.

One added layer with Texas Tech? The turnover rate has spiked without Toppin, who operated as a pressure-release valve. Texas Tech has a 21.8% turnover rate without Toppin on the floor this year against top-100 teams. The Red Raiders’ overall numbers offensively are still excellent without him, but that’s mostly due to running pure from downtown. Texas Tech is shooting 43.7% from 3-point range in those 403 possessions without Toppin. That’s No. 1 in America.

The pressure defense from St. John’s would be salivating at turning those takeaways into touchdowns. Without splashing 12 or 13 triples, it’s hard to envision paths for Texas Tech to beat Pitino’s crew.

There are no easy games in the Round of 32, but Texas Tech would have much smoother schematic edges in other matchups. 

Can anyone stop Michigan before Indianapolis?

Without dynamic guard play, you are dead on arrival against a Michigan defense that takes away almost everything. Arkansas has that in Darius Acuff, who is engineering one of the best seasons that college basketball has ever seen from a freshman guard.

Michigan’s defense forces one of the highest isolation rates. Acuff is one of the premier isolation scorers. You better have legit size to match up with Michigan. Arkansas’ bigs haven’t been awesome this year, but Trevon Brazile, Nick Pringle and Malique Ewin are all high-major bodies with real athleticism. 

Arkansas is also excellent at taking care of the basketball, and it has multiple other break-you-down offensive weapons like Billy Richmond and Meleek Thomas. The breakneck pace of this game could get Michigan’s 7-foot-3 shot-blocker Aday Mara off the floor, plus Arkansas played up to its competition all year. It had Duke on the ropes in November. It beat Texas Tech on a neutral floor in December. It molly-whopped a hyped Vanderbilt team in January. 

Michigan would get the very best out of this group.

I’d be worried that Arkansas’ halfcourt defense couldn’t provide enough resistance against Michigan, but we’re picking nits against one of college basketball’s best rosters.

Arkansas simply has far more firepower than some of the other outfits Michigan could face in the Sweet 16. 

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The matchup North Carolina would prefer not to see

Lead guards like SMU’s Boopie Miller, Wake Forest’s Nate Calmese and Stanford’s Ebuka Okorie absolutely evsicerated the Tar Heels’ defense in early January. To its credit, UNC has started to clean up some of those coverage errors in recent weeks, but I still would prefer to avoid dynamic guards in the first weekend.

Which makes a potential second-round date with Alabama a nightmare, even if UNC star forward Caleb Wilson is back in the mix. Alabama doesn’t just have one good guard. It has three great ones and a few capable backups waiting in the wings. Labaron Philon is a superstar. Aden Holloway is having a terrific second season in Tuscaloosa. Latrell Wrightsell Jr. has found his 3-point shooting stroke. Philon and Holloway could take turns getting into the teeth of this UNC defense at will. 

Alabama is not a good 3-point shooting team. It’s a great one. There would be plenty of opportunities for this group of sharpshooters to get clean looks from downtown against a UNC 3-point defense that has been carved routinely this season. 

Alabama’s rebounding is probably its biggest Achilles heel. UNC would have its chances on the boards, but none of it would really matter if the Tar Heels couldn’t guard the ball against these dynamic guards.

The draw Virginia would not want

You can pick up little tidbits about teams when they play Notre Dame. Micah Shrewsberry is a highly-respected tactician, and he didn’t seem to have a ton of respect for Virginia’s perimeter defenders. Notre Dame lost 100-97 in double-overtime to UVa, but Cole Certa, Braeden Shrewsberry and Jalen Haralson — Notre Dame’s top three guards — erupted for 72 points on 45 shots. 

That would be a flat-out problem against Wisconsin. The Badgers’ guard play is excellent, spearheaded by Nick Boyd and John Blackwell. That duo can score at all three levels, and Wisconsin has one of the better-shooting frontcourts in college basketball. 

Virginia prefers to play drop coverage, but Wisconsin has torn that up all year, especially when Boyd is getting downhill to his left hand and has the throwbacks to Nolan Winter or Austin Rapp for pick-and-pop treys.

Virginia is on the No. 3 seed line, and Wisconsin is on the No. 6 line. A Round of 32 matchup is firmly in play. 

Wisconsin has the guard play to pour salt into Virginia’s biggest wound. 

Florida-Kansas would be a headache for the Jayhawks

Florida is on the No. 2 line, chasing that final No. 1 seed. Kansas is on the No. 4 line, but a No. 3 seed is in reach.

Bill Self should be pleading to the basketball Gods to get Florida as far away from Kansas’ neck of the woods on Selection Sunday. Cincinnati and Arizona have put redshirt-freshman forward Bryson Tiller in the spotlight. Those two enormous front lines went after him relentlessly. Flory Bidunga is an outstanding defender, but he can’t do it alone.

If given the opportunity, Florida coach Todd Golden would do the same thing. Alex Condon, specifically, would likely get plenty of one-on-one opportunities, and Golden is unafraid to tap the button over and over again until the dam breaks.

Kansas would likely have the best player on the floor in Darryn Peterson, but Florida’s avalanche of paint dominance would be a chore for this slightly undersized KU squad.

Buy Kansas on Selection Sunday if its draw includes some teams without elite big men. Sell Kansas on Selection Sunday if its path includes teams with elite frontcourts. I’d be sprinting away from Kansas if it had to play Florida in the Sweet 16. 

Quick-hitters

• Stylistically, Louisville’s dynamic guard play and horde of 3-point shooting could be an issue against this Nebraska defense that floods the paint. Nebraska has been the better team this year, but in a 40-minute game, you could certainly argue that Louisville has the best two players on the floor in Mikel Brown Jr. and Ryan Conwell.
• A team like Gonzaga would give Saint Louis some real problems. Graham Ike would be licking his chops to attack Robbie Avila or Paul Otieno in the paint, and the Zags’ collection of switchable, athletic wings could knock this gorgeous SLU offense out of rhythm. 
• Putting two to the ball has been a death sentence against Illinois this year, thanks to its collection of shooting and decision-makers. Iowa State’s defense thrives on putting two to the ball and generating takeaways, but it would be put in a major bind by a team like this. Illinois (No. 2 seed) and Iowa State (No. 3 seed) could be on a collision course in the Sweet 16 for the second time in three years. Brad Underwood outlasted T.J. Otzelberger in that 2024 chess match.