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| UW-Eau Claire: Still alive. Photo by Steve Frommell, d3photography.com |
The Road to Atlanta will have a slightly different look for everyone, but the interesting parts of this bracket start well before the final eight teams converge. Here's the 2020 NCAA Division III men's basketball tournament bracket as released by the NCAA this afternon.
More tournament info |
In the bracket projection we posted last night we hit on 19 of the 20 at-large picks, and both of the last two teams we discussed actually got in, as Hobart is in the field, as well as UW-Eau Claire. The tournament has four teams from the NEWMAC and three teams from the WIAC, Liberty League and NESCAC.
Jim Calhoun won't have to spend much time on a bus at all, and his St. Joseph (Conn.) team should draw a bunch of interest on their trip to Springfield. Note that the first-round games in the men's tournament this year will have staggered times, and those will be on our schedule page shortly.
The bracket also will have some really interesting first-round matchups, with Elmhurst facing Lycoming at Wooster and Susquehanna squaring off against Benedictine at Wittenberg. We've always said that having Ohio teams able to host are the glue that makes a Division III basketball tournament the most geographically diverse possible, and this is an example of how.
Plus, the two Northwest Conference schools which qualified are sent to different sites in different states, and the SCIAC rep, Pomona-Pitzer, avoids them both and gets a first-round matchup that should provide no complaints in L.A.
The team which made our field but was left out of the tournament was Virginia Wesleyan. With a strength of schedule of .529 and a record of 22-5 against Division III, the Marlins' best win was against Christopher Newport.
Here is the resume for the final team left out of each region:
| Team | Rank | Record vs. D3 | SOS |
| Eastern | Atlantic 4 | 15-10 (.600) | .575 |
| 4-5 vs. RRO (Wins vs. A1, A8, A8, A8; Losses to MA1, A4, NE6, A1, A1) | |||
| UW-La Crosse | Central unranked | 21-6 (.778) | .541 |
| 2-5 vs. RRO (Wins vs. C8, C8; Losses to C1, C1, C7, C7, C7) | |||
| SUNY Potsdam | East 4 | 20-6 (.769) | .525 |
| 5-3 vs. RRO (Wins vs. E1, E7, E7, E8, E8; Losses to E1, E1, E67) | |||
| Albion | Great Lakes 5 | 21-5 (.808) | .530 |
| 0-2 vs. RRO (Losses to GL1, GL4) | |||
| Drew | Middle Atlantic 6 | 20-6 (.769) | .530 |
| 1-3 vs. RRO (Win vs. A3; Losses to MA1, MA8, MA8) | |||
| Amherst | Northeast 8 | 18-8 (.692) | .553 |
| 3-4 vs. RRO (Wins vs. NE1, NE3, NE4; Losses to NE2, NE3, NE7, NE10) | |||
| Virginia Wesleyan | South 6 | 22-5 (.815) | .526 |
| 2-2 vs. RRO (Win vs. MA4, former S7; Losses to S1, S1) | |||
| Redlands | West 7 | 19-7 (.731) | .512 |
| 2-3 vs. RRO (Wins vs. W6, W8; Losses to S3, W6, W6) | |||
More analysis will come, plus Dave McHugh will talk to committee chair Sam Atkinson on Hoopsville this evening.