Texas: March Madness Edition, 2025

It's time again

NEVER HAD A DOUBT

(i had many doubts)

(repeatedly)

(unceasingly)

Well, they’re in. After the Tennessee loss, I had resigned myself to being fine with whatever outcome came about, to the point I was playing a video game when the bracket was announced & found out they were in via texts from friends. This was the bubbliest Texas basketball team I can recall, and they deserved whatever fate befell them. In the end, the selection committee let Texas in. (They also let in North Carolina, who I’m pretty sure would be in the NIT right now if that resume was attached to North Carolina Central or Western Carolina. Who says having your AD in charge of the selection committee doesn’t have perks? Hooray, high-major privilege!) At some point there’s a longer conversation worth having about bracketologists and the problem of herding, as enough of them got the same teams wrong that it indicates a fair number of them were looking at each other’s test answers. Also, I’ll echo Eamonn Brennan’s point that West Virginia got hosed. Their resume was better than North Carolina’s or Texas’ and their fans are rightfully pissed.

West Virginia got hosed

So here we are, looking at a Texas draw that’s….not that bad? Xavier is good but flawed, just like Texas; and out of all of the 6-seeds, Illinois or Mizzou are the ones I’d prefer Texas to face. Kentucky as a 3-seed is challenging but not a monster, and if Troy somehow upsets them…well, we’re getting ahead of ourselves. The point is, there’s a path and some reason for hope, which is more than a lot of us expected after Texas shit the bed against Georgia. And South Carolina. And- you know what, you get it.

I’m not going to spend much time talking about what this tournament bid does (or doesn’t do) for Rodney Terry’s career prospects, we’ll have plenty of time to bat that one around sooner than later.

Xavier (First Four) - Wednesday, 8:10p-ish CT, TruTV

I’ll give the committee this much, they love mess. Two years ago, it was rumored that CDC was very interested in talking to Sean Miller when the season ended, so it was kinda funny that Rodney Terry blitzed Miller’s Xavier team on his way to the Elite Eight and earning the gig permanently. 24 months later, here we are again; if there is a change at Texas, Miller’s probably getting called again. So sure, why not, let’s do this every two years: winner gets Texas.

(Okay, fine, I spent some time on it. I also love mess.)

There are very few holdovers from the game two years ago, but the biggest one is one Texas didn’t actually face: Zach Freemantle. The 24-year-old (!!) has lost large chunks of the last 3 seasons with myriad injuries, but when he’s healthy he presents a lot of problems. Kadin Shedrick & Ze’Rik Onyema are going to have to keep him in check. Meanwhile, Texas guards are going to have to stay home & fight over screens on Ryan Conwell & Dante Maddox or they will hit some threes. Xavier doesn’t really attack the offensive glass (they do go hard for defensive rebounds) so Texas has an opportunity to limit Xavier to one (hopefully contested) shot per possession.

The game is a literal coin flip. KenPom has Xavier 76-75 with a 50% win probability, Torvik has Xavier 76-74 with a 44% WP. I think this is a very winnable game for Texas; Xavier likes to play fast and I think Texas’ athleticism at the 1-4 positions bodes well for transition opportunities. Call me cautiously optimistic that Texas makes it out of this game, though Sean Miller might just use this opportunity to conduct an in-person interview, winning the game and ending the post-game handshake line by waggling his significant eyebrows at CDC. Let’s hope he brings an extra shirt.

Illinois (R64) - Friday, 8:45p-ish CT, CBS

There’s an argument to be made that Illinois is one of the 3 most-talented teams in this region, they have dudes all over the roster & sport some impressive wins over Wisconsin, Oregon, and even beat Michigan by 20 a couple of weeks back. The reason they’re a 6-seed is because they are wildly inconsistent; they lost to Rutgers, and Duke put 110 points on them in a nearly 50-point loss in mid-February. There are some weird reasons for this whipsaw performance; apparently the flu ran through the team for weeks in the middle of the season. I’m guessing Brad Underwood would like to revise his policy of celebrating defensive stops with everybody open-mouth kissing the guy with all the sores. Just slap the floor like every other coach already, the IRS is starting to probe your medical expense budget.

Anyway, the real reason Illinois is all over the map is pretty simple: they shoot a ton of threes and they don’t make many of them. They acknowledge this is a problem, but rather than shoot fewer threes they just go after rebounds with a vengeance. Imagine something along the lines of Texas A&M, but with more three-point attempts and Buzz Williams if he grew his hair out & styled it like he’s watched Wall Street ten too many times.

Illinois aggressively runs teams off the three-point line, which is generally a good policy but doing that against a Texas team full of dudes who hit mid-range jumpers at a high rate is an exploitable weakness. The Illini also don’t force turnovers, which is good if Tramon Mark is going to keep running the point this season. If Illinois doesn’t have a rare hot-shooting night from three, they’re beatable.

Kentucky (R32) - Sunday

You’ve already seen Kentucky and know their deal; it’s an analytics-friendly offense which can scorch the nets when it is humming, and a defense that will allow lightly-contested three-point attempts in exchange for grabbing a high percentage of defensive rebounds. Texas beat this same Kentucky team a month ago, but the question is if Kentucky will still be as short-handed for the tournament. Kerr Kriisa - whose name makes Substack’s spell-check melt down - is done for the year but has been gone so long that Kentucky has adjusted; Jaxson Robinson is also done for the year and missed the first Texas contest, but Lamont Butler will be back and is a substantial piece for this team. It’s also worth noting that Texas won that game from behind on a 14-1 run, so it’s not like this is a script Texas can simply rinse & repeat. They will have their hands full if they make it to this game.

Troy (R32) - Sunday

Troy is coached by Scott Cross, a guy who was successful at UT-Arlington but was fired by UT-A’s AD for not winning like Gonzaga when their program budget was more like… UT-Arlington. He was replaced by Chris Ogden, who loved his time as head coach so much he left to be a non-coach at Texas. Anyway, Cross is a good coach and has taken the team from 9-22 to a tournament berth in 5 seasons. Their offense is great other than the turnovers, and the three-point shooting, and they get shots blocked a lot, and they get the ball stolen. Other than that though…

(If Troy manages to upset Kentucky, does the Tyson Chicken guy or Marquette call Mark Pope first? I’m not sure how this works, maybe they get on a Zoom and try to out-pitch each other.)

Texas facing Troy would be a rare break in Texas’ favor, plus we’d all get the joy of watching Kentucky fans lose their minds for changing coaches and getting the same results. It’s not like we know what that’s like or anything.

Witty Conclusion Heading Here

Ken Pomeroy ran a million tournament sims, because why run 100,000 when you can do that ten times over? Texas made it to R32 16.9% of the time and the S16 6.4%; I might be slightly more bullish than those numbers, as I think the coin flip nature of the Xavier game is understandably weighing the odds down significantly. Texas will be the underdog in every game beyond Xavier, and they should be. It’s a narrow path to the second weekend, and if Texas somehow makes it there then they likely start running into real heavyweights like Tennessee & Houston. Given how this season has gone, a single win in the tournament would be nice, but this is not the week of the season where you dream small. Onto Indianapolis!