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Sunday, Mar. 10, 2002 - 6:55 p.m.

Let the Madness begin

There's a lot that goes into selecting the NCAA men's basketball tournament teams, and then seeding them and placing them at sites around the country. Nobody will ever know what's involved in the process, and there are plenty of people who will be annoyed each and every year.

Count me as one of them this year.

Notre Dame got in, as expected, yet received little respect from the seeding committee. The Irish were selected as the No. 8 seed in the South region, one slot higher than last year's No. 7 placement. Last year's team went 19-9 before the tournament and won the Big East West Division before losing in the quarterfinals of the Big East Tournament. This year's team is 21-10 going in with a second-place finish in the Big East West and a loss in the Big East semifinals. Last year it was Troy Murphy and Co.; this season it's a more balanced, more dangerous, better team (led by Chris Thomas). In short, it's a better team that played a tougher schedule and played it well (losing the 10 games by a total of 42 points, a 4.2-point average margin of loss). ND's worst loss was a 10-point Georgetown win in South Bend without one of its key players, a loss that the Irish avenged in Washington later in the season.

But it's not so much the No. 8 seed or the placement in Greenville, S.C., when many schools are getting sent closer to home (Penn and Pitt in Pittsburgh, Maryland in D.C., etc.). Notre Dame could've been sent to Chicago or even St. Louis (where the women won the national title last year). But Greenville's not so bad.

The bad part is what happens if the Irish beat Charlotte in their first-round game on Thursday: They meet Duke on Saturday.

Apparently, the committee didn't look at Notre Dame's season, at the aforementioned margin of loss, about the two key victories over Pitt, a top 10 team that got a No. 3 seed, or the victory at Miami. I guess it didn't look at a one-point loss at Indiana (a No. 5 seed), a loss to Kentucky (a No. 4 seed), a two-point loss to Alabama (a No. 2 seed). They're all losses, yes, but they're not bad losses. Notre Dame has one, maybe two bad losses this season, tops. Few, if any, teams with 10 losses can say that.

This Notre Dame team is a Sweet 16-caliber team, one that could surprise some people. It's a No. 7 seed that could upset a No. 2 seed, or a No. 6 seed that could take out a No. 3 seed. I suppose it's a good sign that Notre Dame has made two straight NCAA tournaments, that it has three consecutive seasons with 20 wins. And I guess I should be happy that this year I can bitch about the placement rather than just be happy they made the field. But instead I see it as there are a lot of people who think that Notre Dame is an eight seed without a future beyond March 16.

That is, of course, until the Irish shock the country and knock an over-confident Duke team out of the tournament on Saturday.

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