St. Louis bracket

Teams that can win: Florida, Wisconsin, Arizona.

Yup, I left out Oregon, Maryland, Butler and Notre Dame.

Florida is the defending champ with virtually all of last year's pieces intact. They're going to be tough to beat, to say the least. I saw Florida play Kentucky this year at Rupp Arena. The game was for ESPN and it’s a big rivalry so they went all out at Rupp: fireworks, loud music, booing at the opponent, all that yadda yadda yadda. Normally I don't care one way or the other about that stuff but in that particular game I thought it worked to Florida's advantage rather than Kentucky's. I kept thinking to myself, 'These guys are the champs, they're not intimidated by this shit.' Maybe the #1 team is intimidated or the road favorite or the conference rival--maybe you can pysche these opponents out. But not the defending champs, they've already won everything there is to win and they love the attention! Predictably, UK came out tight, never got their perimeter shooting going and even though they were generally better than Florida that night, they didn't score the points and didn't get the W. I blame the frickin' hype! These Florida guys have already had their glory, they won't be intimidated by anyone any more. That said, they're not flawless, they do go cold from time to time and as heralded as Joakim Noah is, he doesn't drive the offense and he can be marginalized. (Incidentally, Taurean Green is the star of that show, he's the one that keeps the ball moving and makes it happen--he's maybe the most underappreciated player in all of college basketball)

It will take a giant effort from Wisconsin but they can beat Florida. If they can dominate the boards, which they can do, then they limit Noah and Horford and put the pressure on the outside shooting, then they can drive Florida to cold spells. If Florida goes cold then they can crumble and if Wisconsin makes the most of their opportunities then they'll win--and I think they will. Of course they'll have to win three games before getting their shot at Florida and Wisconsin is certainly capable of blowing it at the wrong moment. But I'm betting they side step the land mines.

Why did I mention Arizona? Because they've got the talent, they just haven't made the most of it. Schizo teams like that can appear out of the darkness sometimes and they'll have their shot at Florida early on. If they can pull off the stunner (I'd be surprised if they did), then they can just keep rolling because they won't play another team as good as Florida for a while.