SOUTH REGION
The top four seeds
No. 1 Kentucky (32-2): The 24-game win streak ended with a loss to Vanderbilt in the SEC tournament final, but now the Wildcats hope to do what the 1996 team did after losing to Mississippi State in the SEC Final – win the national title.
No. 2 Duke (27-6): The Blue Devils have lost two of their past three games, including by 18 to North Carolina.
No. 3 Baylor (27-7): The Bears started the season 17-0 but didn’t fare well against the top teams in the Big 12, going 0-5 against Kansas and Missouri.
No. 4 Indiana (25-8): The Hoosiers are the only team besides Vanderbilt to beat Kentucky this season (Dec. 10) and the first in school history to beat a No. 1 and No. 2 (Ohio State on Dec. 31) in the same season.
Four players to watch
Anthony Davis, forward, Kentucky: the 6-foot-10 freshman phenom for Kentucky is not only a dominant shot blocker, averaging a whopping 4.6 per game, but he can dribble, pass and shoot with decent range. Assuming he turns pro after the season, he’ll be the No. 1 overall pick in the NBA draft.
Austin Rivers, guard, Duke: He showed his range with the 3-pointer over Tyler Zeller to beat North Carolina at the buzzer on Feb. 8, but he’s even tougher off the dribble.
Cody Zeller, center, Indiana: North Carolina standout Tyler Zeller’s 6-foot-11, 230 pound younger brother is averaging 15.5 points and 6.4 rebounds as a freshman.
Jeremy Lamb, Connecticut: The 6-foot-5 sophomore from Norcross leads the Huskies with 17.7 points in 37.2 minutes per game.
Top three storylines
Connecticut coach Jim Calhoun missed 11 games this season, three over NCAA violations and eight on medical leave.
Between Kentucky, Duke, Indiana and Connecticut, the South has 19 national titles worth of NCAA tournament royalty including the defending national champion Huskies.
Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski could face his longtime assistant Mike Brey in the second round if both the Blue Devils and Notre Dame advance. Coach K is 14-0 against his former assistants.
Most intriguing first-round matchup
Wichita State could be this year’s VCU, if the Shockers can get past – well VCU -- in the first round. Wichita State coach Gregg Marshall, who made seven NCAA tournament appearances with Winthrop, will have to get past Shaka Smart and the streaking VCU team which has won six in a row and won 17 of 18.
Best potential second-round matchup
Kentucky, a popular choice to win the national championship, could advance to face defending national champion Connecticut if the No. 9 Huskies get past No. 8 Iowa State. Connecticut has 13 losses but came within a basket of Syracuse, the No. 1 seed in the East, twice in the last two weeks of the season.
Bracket buster
UNLV is playing in its third straight NCAA tournament with a shot to make it to its first Sweet 16 since 2007 when it beat Georgia Tech and Wisconsin.
Sound bite
“I think the committee did no favors for the No.1 overall seed (Kentucky). This is the toughest region in the bracket,” said ESPN analyst Dick Vitale.
The numbers game
20
Years since Duke and Kentucky met in the 1992 regional final famous for Christian Laettner’s last second shot.
4
UNLV is one of the four teams from the eight-team Mountain West to make the tournament field, the same number chosen from the SEC
2007
The last time a No. 1 overall seed won the NCAA tournament, the Florida Gators.
Now you know
Lehigh may hail from the Patriot League but Mountain Hawks guard C.J. McCollum has drawn the attention of NBA scouts. He’s averaging 21.9 points per game, fifth-best nationally.
Bound for the Sweet 16
CBS analyst Seth Davis picks Kentucky, Wichita State, UNLV and Duke.
Bound for the Final Four
Davis picks Kentucky. “In the end, nobody can come close to matching Kentucky in terms of talent,” Davis said. “The only team that can beat Kentucky is Kentucky. I don't see that happening, especially after they lost in the SEC final.”
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