Houston
The Cougars (24-3) have won seven in a row and nine of their last 10, claiming the American Athletic Conference Tournament title. Coach Kelvin Sampson has the second-best defense in the country statistically, limiting opponents to 57.9 points a game. The offense is potent, ranking eighth in KenPom-adjusted offensive efficiency. Quentin Grimes, a Kansas transfer, leads the Cougars in scoring with 18 points a game.
San Diego State
The Aztecs (23-4) have won 14 consecutive games and haven t lost since mid-January, rolling through Mountain West competition to secure a No. 6 seed. SDSU coach Brian Dutcher made this program a defensive juggernaut, and this year s team ranks seventh in field-goal percentage defense (39%).
Film review: The defensive tendencies Syracuse could exploit against SDSU
Courtesy of SDSU Athletics
For Syracuse to advance to the next round of the NCAA Tournament, they ll need to break SDSU s defense open.
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San Diego State is a defensive-minded program under head coach Brian Dutcher. It has ranked in the top 40 in adjusted defense in three of his four seasons, including 11th this year and 10th in 2020.
“Our expectations are that we play passionate and perfect basketball on the defensive end,” Dutcher said in November.
SDSU, which held teams to under 60 points in 13 games this season, plays man-to-man defense with an emphasis on helping into the paint similar to a pack-line and can press when it needs to. The Aztecs play a traditional center almost all the time and don’t like to switch screens.
Mar 17, 2021
It’s the age-old question every March Madness as you’re filling out your bracket: Which upsets should I choose? It’s a question that lingers not just as you survey the first round, but also when deciding which lower-seeded teams to advance to the Sweet 16 and beyond.
Have no fear with fewer than 48 hours left to fill out your men’s NCAA tournament bracket, we’re here to help. We asked five of our college hoops writers five questions relating to upsets and bold predictions, ranging from the first round to the Final Four. Who are we confident will win? Who are we confident
Everyone loves to find the sleepers in their NCAA brackets, and this year is no different.
Most nonconference games in November and December were canceled due to COVID-19. So many of the best smaller and mid-major schools never got their chances against the major conferences this season. These smaller schools, limited to mostly conference games, did not really have the opportunity to show the nation how good they were.
That all changes Friday morning when the first round of the NCAA tournament tips off. Most smaller and mid-major conferences are sending their top teams to the Big Dance this year after winning their conference tournaments. This is a huge reason the upsets will come, and possibly in bunches. In many previous seasons, we had so many conference tournament upsets at the smaller and mid-major level that these leagues often did not get to show off their best teams. But this year the biggest upsets came in the power conferences, so the best of the smaller schools will