Tracking how schools we dislike intensely are faring in the 2026 NCAA D-1 basketball playoffs. Thursday 3/19 on opening day the 1-seed Duke came within 6 points of being upset by 16-seed Siena, the Siena outside Albany in case there are multiples. Each of the four regions has seeds 1 to 16.
This has me thinking of what's the highest (academic) ranked team to make the tournament, to survive to the second (Sweet 16) and third (Final Four) weekends. 14-seed Penn plays 3-seed Illinois 9:25 tonight. I regret to inform you that 8-seed The Ohio State is already ousted.
In the tournament this year: Penn, Michigan, Vanderbilt, Virginia, UCLA, Villanova, Illinois, Lehigh (a first-four team; they play in to be one of the cannon-fodder 16-seeds and did not make it). Who else? No Stanford, finished tenth in the Atlantic Coast Conference. MIT plays D-III.