Who Can Actually Pull Off First-Round NCAA Tournament Upsets?

The committee gave us some juicy stat-picks this year!

With the NCAA tournament brackets out, let’s take a quick look at the most likely Round-of-64 upsets that should be on your radar. For this post, I’ll perform a very simple exercise — calculating the Log5 formula on a Pythagorean-formula version of Ken Pomeroy’s ratings (yes, I know KenPom has moved on from that method, but it is quick and easy!) — to find the teams at each seed-line that have the highest chance of winning.

No. 9 seeds

Best pick: Auburn over Iowa (58.3%)

See also: Florida Atlantic over Memphis (51.4%); West Virginia over Maryland (50.9%)

Maybe avoid: Illinois over Arkansas (43.7%)

Led by Auburn’s really solid upset odds, three of the four 9-seeds this year have a better than 50% chance to beat their 8th-seeded counterpart. But maybe that makes sense, as 9-seeds actually have a winning record over 8-seeds in the 64-team era.

No. 10 seeds

Best pick: Utah St. over Missouri (64.3%)

See also: Boise St. over Northwestern (56.1%); USC over Michigan St. (47.0%)

Maybe avoid: Penn St. over Texas A&M (37.6%)

The very best potential upset of the entire Round of 64 belongs to Utah State, against No. 7 seed Mizzou in the South regional. The Aggies rank 18th nationally in KenPom’s ratings, while the Tigers sit all the way down at No. 51, despite the seed differential going in the opposite direction. The only concern here is that it’s almost too obvious of an upset pick, so others in your pool might take it too. If you want a slightly less likely alternative, Boise State over Northwestern in the West is worth considering as well.

No. 11 seeds

Best pick: Providence over Kentucky (41.5%)

See also: ASU/Nevada over TCU (38.0%)

Maybe avoid: MSU/Pitt over Iowa St. (34.4%); N.C. State over Creighton (29.9%)

The Friars aren’t exactly an elite KenPom team — they rank 44th — but Kentucky (No. 28) isn’t its usual elite self, either. And if Providence wins, it would likely get a second-round date with an overseeded K-State team, so keep the Friars on Cinderella watch. The rest of these upsets are no better than the historical average for 11-seeds, although Nevada (No. 43) and Miss. State (No. 49) are worth watching if they win the play-in.

No. 12 seeds

Best pick: Drake over Miami FL (46.0%)

See also: Oral Roberts over Duke (34.5%)

Maybe avoid: Charleston over San Diego St. (26.6%); VCU over Saint Mary's (26.1%)

Everyone loves a good 12-over-5 upset, and the committee fed us a really obvious candidate in Drake over Miami — a much more competitive matchup on paper than we usually get to see in this seed combo. Duke haters might also be tempted to pull the trigger on an Oral Roberts, but in truth that’s no more likely than all 12-versus-5 matchups from history (most of which don’t turn into upsets).

No. 13 seeds

Best pick: Kent St. over Indiana (36.7%)

See also: Furman over Virginia (27.7%)

Maybe avoid: Iona over Connecticut (18.8%); Louisiana over Tennessee (12.2%)

Yet another very glaring upset pick served up by the committee’s seeding is Kent State over Indiana in the Midwest regional. While the Hoosiers are still more likely to win than not, and 13-over-4 upsets happen less than once a year on average, the Golden Flashes’ odds are much higher than the historical winning percentage for 13-seeds. Furman over UVA in the South comes with higher odds than the 13-seed norm as well, but you’d be well-served not to pick multiple No. 13s to win in a single tournament — that has only happened 5 times since 1985.

No. 14 seeds

Best pick: UC Santa Barbara over Baylor (20.6%)

See also: Montana St. over Kansas St. (19.9%); Kennesaw St. over Xavier (15.8%)

Maybe avoid: Grand Canyon over Gonzaga (13.3%)

Those feeling especially adventurous have some opportunities with this crop of 14-seeds. Both UC-Santa Barbara and Montana State have odds about 5 percentage points above the usual No. 14’s success rate, and even Kennesaw State is a shade over average.

15-seeds and beyond

Best pick: East #15 Vermont over Marquette (14.9%)

See also: South #15 Princeton over Arizona (12.9%); Midwest #15 Colgate over Texas (10.2%)

Wins by seeds No. 15 and 16 are much, much rarer than other types of upsets, and should seldom be picked unless there’s a very good reason. But Vermont, Princeton and Colgate are better than the typical 15-seeds — for whatever that’s worth.