A #1 seed will go down in the next 5 years

[Cydkar]

#15 seeds have four wins in the 26 years since the tournament last expanded:

hampton over iowa state
richmond over syracuse
coppin state over south carolina
santa clara over arizona

i agree that this expansion makes it slightly more likely that a 16 will win... instead of being mediocre minor programs that somehow won their conference tourneys (those teams will now be 17s), 16s will be minor programs that actually had good years.

as to the other point, i bet the ncaa will forbid networks from referring to the 16/17 games as play-in games. these games will be officially referred to as part of the tournament and treated as such. i actually think it's a decent deal for these teams-- rather than just being sacrificial lambs to a #1, they get a chance to play a competitive game on national tv. seems like a fair trade-off to me.

ISU was overseeded and missed critical free throws. It will continue to happen to #2 seeds.

 

[ssckelley]

The expansion will put 3 more bubble teams into the tournament, possibly as high as the 13 seed. This will push all the small schools down into the 14, 15, and 16 seed play in games. Those former 15 seeds are now going to be 16 seed play in games so a Robert Morris who gave Villanova all they wanted will possibly play a Duke or Kentucky with a shot at knocking them off. Imagine that 1993 Santa Clara team with Steve Nash knocking off the #1 seed instead of the #2 seed. There has been close games in the 1/16 matchup and when you push better, sometimes overlooked, teams into those play in games then you increase the chances of seeing an upset.