The NCAA Selection Committee put out its top 16 teams today. If the season ended this weekend, those 16 teams would be seeded and placed in the bracket in that order. The important part for the Wisconsin fan is that it quietly boosted the Badger tournament resume in two distinct ways.
Wisconsin is already looking like a tournament team (even with the frustrating loss to Ohio State), but now they have a really strong case, officially. The Badgers have wins against three of the top 16 seeds and only two losses from that group.
NEW: A look at the committee's official top 16 overall seeds 👀
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What's your BIGGEST takeaway from today's Bracket Preview? 🤔👇 pic.twitter.com/VBdYjhqeQr
Wisconsin's tournament resume looks really strong with the NCAA Selection 16 team reveal
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The obvious boost is that Wisconsin has wins over the No. 1 overall seed, the No. 7 seed, and the No. 14 seed. Those wins against Michigan, Illinois, and Michigan State continue to age like fine wine. There isn't another team that can boast wins like Wisconsin can. Not only because they have three wins in this field, but because the Badgers still have the only win over Michigan.
The second major boost is that Wisconsin has two losses in this group. It works as a double spin. One is losing against a top-16 team isn't going to be considered a bad loss. It won't damage the resume, but the second thing is that Wisconsin is 3-2 against this field.
With eight losses on its record, Wisconsin actually doesn't have a single bad one. Every loss comes from a team inside the top-50 in NET. This is also a big key to their resume boost.
Wisconsin has a really solid resume, but UW can't keep adding losses to it. The Ohio State game will end up being a wash, but Wisconsin needs to win four of its final five games to keep considered a non-bubble resume, starting tomorrow with Iowa.