Ed. note – check back often as this post will be updated regularly…

How about those brackets?  If you’re like us, you’ve already figured a way that just about every team will both win and lose its first round game.   For example, Arizona has better talent than Utah, but which Wildcat team will show up – the one from mid-season or the one from the last three weeks?  Decisions, decisions…

To help you think more clearly about your bracket as well as to institute some fun into the analysis that you’re no doubt already obsessing over, we have put together a nice breakdown of each region for you.  We’ll give you the teams that are overseeded, underseeded, and are guaranteed to advance.  The best games to watch in the first round and in the later rounds.  The juiciest match-ups for purists and casual fans.  Some sleeper teams for both the Sweets and the Four.  Upsets.  Thanks to the RTC Region correspondents, basically, you name it, we’ve got it.

We will be doing Boom Goes the Dynamite! all weekend starting with Thursday’s games, as appropriate.  Since our manpower will be lower than usual, we’ll be relying on you guys to help us out in the comments as we move through the first 48 games.

We are also privileged to have RTC Live at the Philadelphia pod this weekend.  The games we will be covering are:

• #8 BYU vs. #9 Texas A&M – 12:30pm Thurs. 3/19

Here are the links for each QnD Region Analysis (+ correspondent), which will take you to another page on the site called 2009 Tourney Previews (which can also be accessed through the handy-dandy tab above):

• East (Dave Zeitlin and Steve Moore)
• South (Mike Lemaire)
• Midwest (Zach Hayes)
• West (Ryan ZumMallen)

We also have Game-by-Game Analysis for the entirety of the First Round…

• East (Thu. games and Fri. games)
  
• South
• Midwest
• West (Thu. games and Fri. games)
  

Here are some of our other features celebrating what we like to call, “Christmas in March“:

Mascot Death Match – First Round (vote for which mascot would win a battle to the death!)

• Thursday Games
• Friday Games
• Day 3
  

The Top 3 Sweetest NCAA Moments

• #1 – The ’79 Tourney – More than Just Magic & Larry
• #2 – The Open Road Leads to the Final Four
• #3 – Loved, Hated But Never Ignored
  

Behind the Lines – NCAA Tourney

• NCAA Tournament Day One
  

Some Hooponomics

• Why You Should Be Wary of Pitt
• Pythagorean Consistency
• Offensive Variation and A Short Word about Defense
  

Columnists

• Beware Bracket Advice! (John Stevens)
• It’s Christmas in March (Dave Zeitlin)
• NCAA Basketball 2009 – the BCS Version (nvr1983)

John Stevens from Las Vegas – coming soon…

… and more.

2009 Team Tourney Previews: We enlisted the help of our legion of correspondents and readers to put together previews for all 65 teams in order to give you the most insightful analysis you will find anywhere. We’ll be uploading previews over the next 24 hours so check back frequently.

East Region
#1 Pittsburgh
#2 Duke
#3 Villanova
#4 Xavier
#5 Florida State
#6 UCLA
#7 Texas
#8 Oklahoma State
#9 Tennessee
#10 Minnesota
#11 Virginia Commonwealth
#12 Wisconsin
#13 Portland State
#14 American
#15 Binghamton
#16 East Tennessee State

South Region
#1 UNC
#2 Oklahoma
#3 Syracuse
#4 Gonzaga
#5 Illinois
#6 Arizona State
#7 Clemson
#8 LSU
#9 Butler
#10 Michigan
#11 Temple
#12 Western Kentucky
#13 Akron
#14 Stephen F. Austin
#15 Morgan State
#16 Radford

Midwest Region
#1 Louisville
#2 Michigan State
#3 Kansas
#4 Wake Forest
#5 Utah
#6 West Virginia
#7 Boston College
#8 Ohio State
#9 Siena
#10 USC
#11 Dayton
#12 Arizona
#13 Cleveland State
#14 North Dakota State
#15 Robert Morris
#16 Alabama State / Morehead State

West Region
#1 UConn
#2 Memphis
#3 Missouri
#4 Washington
#5 Purdue
#6 Marquette
#7 California
#8 BYU
#9 Texas A&M
#10 Maryland
#11 Utah State
#12 Northern Iowa
#13 Mississippi State
#14 Cornell
#15 Cal State-Northridge
#16 Chattanooga

rtmsf (3998 Posts)

This entry was posted on Monday, March 16th, 2009 at 1:06 am by rtmsf and is filed under 2009 ncaa tournament. Tagged: 2009 ncaa tournament, akron, alabama state, american, arizona, arizona state, binghamton, boston college, butler, byu, cal state northridge, california, chattanooga, clemson, cleveland state, cornell, dayton, duke, east tennessee state, florida state, fsu, gonzaga, illinois, kansas, louisville, lsu, marquette, maryland, memphis, michigan, michigan state, minnesota, mississippi state, missouri, morehead state, morgan state, ncaa tournament, north dakota state, northern iowa, ohio state, oklahoma, oklahoma state, pittsburgh, portland state, purdue, radford, Regional Preview, robert morris, siena, stephen f austin, syracuse, temple, tennessee, texas, texas a&m, ucla, uconn, unc, usc, ut chattanooga, utah, utah state, vcu, villanova, virginia commonwealth, wake forest, washington, west virginia, western kentucky, wisconsin, xavier. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.