Couch: What Michigan State's NCAA tournament seed should be and how far MSU can climb

Lansing State Journal

Tom Izzo coached Michigan State to its biggest win of the season Saturday. On Sunday, he found out that was only good enough to make the Spartans a No. 3 seed in the NCAA tournament, if the season ended today.

This is the ninth and final installment of a regular column in which Lansing State Journal columnist Graham Couch explains his weekly AP Top 25 basketball ballot. Read here for his criteria and further explanation. Since the NCAA tournament selection committee revealed its own rankings of sorts on Sunday, an early look at the top 16 teams as they stand, the AP poll is no longer a relevant ranking, even as a discussion piece.

The NCAA tournament selection committee’s early evaluation of Michigan State’s basketball team was a jarring reminder of the flaws in the system.

The committee, if you missed it, announced Sunday that the 24-3 Spartans would be a No. 3 seed — the 11th-best team overall — if the season were to have ended this past weekend.

MSU faithful reacted with appropriate dismay.

The Spartans, however, probably shouldn’t be a No. 1 seed right now, either, which is where they’d be if you consider the USA Today Coaches and Associated Press polls, which rank the Spartans Nos. 1 and 2, respectively.

I ranked MSU No. 6 on my AP ballot this week, which would make them a No. 2 seed.

Here are the top 16 on my ballot, followed by the selection committee’s top 16 in parentheses:

1. Virginia (1)
2. Villanova (2)
3. Texas Tech (10)
4. Xavier (3)
5. Ohio State (14)
6. Michigan State (11)
7. Purdue (4)
8. Duke (7)
9. Cincinnati (8)
10. Clemson (9)
11. North Carolina (12)
12. Kansas (6)
13. Arizona (15)
14. Michigan (NR)
15. Auburn (5)
16. West Virginia (NR)

MORE: Graham Couch's complete AP basketball ballot

You can see where I disagree especially: Texas Tech, Ohio State, MSU, Kansas, Auburn.

So let’s tackle those teams, beginning with MSU.

In the polls, you can argue for the Spartans anywhere between Nos. 1 and 7, depending on your criteria. If you heavily value the most recent result and the eye test and see MSU a certain way — considering what else happened near the top of the poll — there’s nothing wrong with having MSU at No. 1. The Spartans were previously No. 4 on most ballots. They beat the No. 3 team on Saturday, while the other top two teams lost at home last week. There’s a lot of easy logic in moving MSU to the top.

If you take a more holistic approach to a ballot, having MSU as low as No. 7 is good by me, too. Virginia and Texas Tech both have better recent resumes (even with Virginia’s home loss to Virginia Tech last weekend). Ohio State and Xavier arguably had better weeks than MSU. Villanova is playing without two injured starters. And Purdue, well, losing by three points on a last-second shot on the road doesn’t automatically make you worse or less deserving than the team that hit the shot. It makes you about even and calls for a comparison of the rest of your resume. You can contend that the Boilermakers, other than Saturday, have the stronger sheet.

But you cannot argue MSU as No. 11. Or Texas Tech at 10. Or Kansas at No. 6. No way, no how. Not unless you’re relying too much on metrics that don’t tell a season’s story.

I don’t like that the College Football Playoff committee chooses what it thinks are the four best teams instead of the four most deserving teams. But I also think the college hoops committee could use a little more of that — a little more eye test and critical thinking, a bit more hoops acumen. Because its seeds in Sunday’s early reveal were too reliant on one metric, the Ratings Percentage Index.

The RPI fails to capture how teams can change within a season from November to February, including injuries, and (gulp) overvalues strength of schedule, while dismissing how a team wins or loses. For example, Purdue’s 68-65 loss at MSU might as well have been 108-25, as far as the RPI is concerned. As one tool, the RPI is helpful. As a primary guide, which it appears to have been for the committee, it’s a problem.

MORE: Couch: Miles Bridges, Michigan State give their season a chance with win over Purdue

MSU, according to the RPI, has just two top 50 wins — against North Carolina on a neutral court and Saturday at home against Purdue. And, to be fair to the committee, the weakness of the bottom half of the Big Ten this year and the unfortunate one-plays in the league schedule (with MSU meeting Purdue, Michigan, Ohio State and Nebraska just once) makes it hard to consider the Spartans for a No. 1 seed right now.

Virginia, for example, has eight top-50 RPI wins, three on the road, including at Duke. Villanova also has eight top-50 wins, including a 24-point win over Xavier and double-digit wins over Gonzaga and Tennessee.

The other two No. 1 seeds are where things get murky. Xavier, for example, has six top-50 wins, but five of them are against teams ranked Nos. 25-31. The RPI sees Providence and Creighton as significantly better than Nebraska (55) and Maryland (60) and Penn State (84). If you know basketball and have been watching over the last month, you know differently.

Purdue is an interesting case as a No. 1 seed. The Boilermakers have five top-50 wins and three top-50 losses (like MSU). But if you are to consider their November wins over Arizona (who was playing horribly at the time) and Louisville (which isn’t that good) and Butler, then you must also consider their Nov. 23 loss to Western Kentucky (which actually isn’t that bad). The RPI doesn’t measure any of this adequately.

What arguably legitimately separates Purdue from MSU is the Boilermakers’ two wins over Michigan, a team that beat MSU convincingly in East Lansing in their only matchup. And a dominant January stretch. But, based on the committee's choices, I don't know how much that stretch is factored in.

MSU’s biggest problem to this point — other than a loss to Ohio State which wrecked its confidence for a while — is lack of opportunity. There’s a solution moving forward, as the Big Ten goes to a 20-game schedule: Flex scheduling. Everyone plays 14 games (the entire league once and a protected rival twice), then splits, with the top seven teams playing each other again, while the bottom seven play again, as well. There are problems with this that would have to be sorted out. But it would solve a lot of the strength-of-schedule issues, while validating the regular season championship. More on this perhaps in another column later.

If the committee sees MSU as No. 11 right now, the reality is it’ll be tough for MSU to climb up seven spots, even if the Spartans run the table, including three road wins and two neutral-site wins over top Big Ten teams at the Big Ten tournament.

As I see it, right now, MSU, Purdue and Ohio State should all be No. 2 seeds. As the committee sees it, I don't think the Spartans and Buckeyes can reach the 1-seed line.

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Ohio State, which the committee has at No. 14 overall and a 4 seed, is hurt by its rough start — this is an entirely different team than it was most of November and December — and by a recent home loss to Penn State, which has better talent (which is starting to show) than its resume would indicate. Penn State’s underachieving, along with the severe falloffs this year at Wisconsin, Iowa and Indiana and the in-season collapse of Minnesota is limiting to the top of the league. So, blame the committee, but also blame Pat Chambers, Fran McCaffrey, Greg Gard and Richard Pitino.

The Buckeyes are 3-0 against MSU, Purdue and Michigan. And have lost once since Christmas. If they’re the No. 14 team in college basketball, this is the greatest season in the history of college hoops.

Texas Tech got it just as bad from the committee. The Red Raiders might not have Kansas’ hoops brand, but they’ve got a better basketball team, with a better resume. Texas Tech has five top-50 wins, including at Kansas by 12 points, and, outside of the top 50, has a 36-point win over Northwestern and a 19-point win at Kansas State this past weekend.

Kansas has seven top-50 wins, but two losses outside of the top 50, and none of those top 50 wins are in the top 15. One is against Kentucky, which the RPI entirely overvalues at No. 18. The Jayhawks also only ever beat anyone by about about five points, while the Red Raiders are thumping many of their opponents. The RPI doesn’t measure this. Apparently, neither did the committee. Never mind Texas Tech’s win at Phog Allen Fieldhouse.

Auburn, which the committee sees as the top No. 2 seed and No. 5 overall, has four top-50 wins. But three of those are Middle Tennessee State, Arkansas and Missouri, which are outside the top 20 and perhaps overvalued by the RPI. Beyond that, they played an intentionally ho-hum non-conference schedule. Not one that just turned out to be ho-hum.

The hope for MSU, Ohio State, Texas Tech and any other team that worries it’ll be spurned on the real Selection Sunday is that the committee feels the blowback for this past Sunday’s selections and adjusts its metrics and approach out of shame. With a few of its selections, it should be embarrassed.

The good news is, unlike football, this will all get decided on the court anyway. It might just be a harder road than MSU and some others deserved.

Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Graham_Couch.