The final Saturday of the men’s college basketball regular season gave us our first two official participants in the 2026 NCAA Tournament — congrats, LIU Sharks and Tennessee State Tigers! — bubble teams hurting and helping themselves, technical fouls for the Hurley brothers (with an ejection for Dan) and another potentially serious injury for a national championship contender.
Eight days from the unveiling of the official 68-team bracket, a change at the top of the bracket projections was necessitated. Florida has been playing like a No. 1 seed for some time now, but Connecticut’s surprise 68-62 loss at 11-19 Marquette (capped with that ejection), in tandem with the Gators’ 84-77 win at Kentucky, will put Florida on the top line in The Athletic’s Bracket Watch.
Connecticut (27-4) will drop to a No. 2 seed, despite a 77-73 win over Florida (25-6) in December in New York. Both teams can add to their profiles in their respective conference tournaments next week. But the predictive metrics that heavily influence seeding are increasingly favoring Florida. After Saturday’s results, Florida’s KenPom ranking was No. 4 while UConn dropped to No. 11.
The resume metrics still slightly favor UConn, though, and the Florida result, along with wins at Kansas and against Illinois on a neutral court, outshine Florida’s top three triumphs — at Kentucky, at Vanderbilt and Arkansas at home. Florida plays in a stronger conference, has a 12-7 edge in Quad 1 wins and has won 11 games in a row.
UConn has lost three of its past eight games, including a Quad 3 loss at home against Creighton that, combined with the loss to Marquette, is worse than any of Florida’s defeats. It all adds up to an edge for Florida, but not an insurmountable one. In a weak Big East, UConn likely needs a rubber match and victory against St. John’s — a team it obliterated 72-40 on Feb. 25 — to give itself a chance to be the fourth No. 1 seed alongside Duke, Michigan and Arizona.
Here are other observations from Saturday’s action. — Joe Rexrode
Iowa State battles for No. 2 seed and more Bracket Watch implications
With Florida and Connecticut battling for the last spot on the top line, there’s a glut along the second and third lines. Houston hasn’t looked like a No. 2 seed at times in recent weeks, but a comeback win Saturday at Oklahoma State kept the Cougars in a strong position to end up with one.
Big 12 rival Iowa State also avoided an upset at home against Arizona State to stay in the fight. With Nebraska losing earlier this week at UCLA, Michigan State and Illinois are right there with Iowa State to finish as No. 2 seeds. Nebraska remains close enough that serious work in the Big Ten tournament could lift Fred Hoiberg’s Cornhuskers, who project as a strong No. 3 seed right now.
Purdue, which lost Saturday at home to Wisconsin, is out of the No. 2 seed race. The Boilermakers’ best hope is a No. 3 seed. Texas Tech also suffered a damaging loss this week, at home against TCU, and then followed that up with an 82-76 defeat Saturday to a sliding BYU team.
Gonzaga, which came in as a No. 4 seed in last week’s Bracket Watch, still has a shot at a No. 3 seed. A WCC title game win over Saint Mary’s could be enough. Kansas is also still in the mix for a No. 3 seed, and the Big 12 Tournament will provide ample opportunity.
Further down the seeding list, teams that helped themselves the most Saturday included Vanderbilt (a No. 5 seed last week), which won at Tennessee; Arkansas (No. 5 seed), which won at Missouri; and Louisville (No. 7 seed), which won at Miami.
Every No. 6 seed lost at least one game last week. Kentucky lost twice and Saint Louis was routed 86-57 on Saturday at George Mason. — Rexrode
Purdue drops out of the No. 2 seedline after a loss to Wisconsin. (Michael Reaves / Getty Images)
Badgers spring past Purdue
The road warriors of the Big Ten struck again on Saturday. Already holding wins at Michigan and Illinois, Wisconsin pulled off a third huge road victory at Purdue, 97-93. This was no fluke, either: The Badgers led for nearly the entire second half, with the guard tandem of Nick Boyd and John Blackwell combining for 48 points while dominating off the bounce.
Even more impressively, the Badgers did so without starting big man Nolan Winter, who missed the game with an ankle injury. That’s especially impressive considering the inexperience of their frontcourt beyond Winter, a multi-year starter. Before Saturday, per CBB Analytics, Wisconsin had a +20.9 Net Rating when Winter was on the court, a 96th percentile mark in the country. Wisconsin’s younger big men stepped up in his absence: Austin Rapp and Aleksas Bieliauskas combined for 33 points and went 8-of-13 from beyond the arc.
Purdue is reeling to end the season. The Boilermakers — the preseason No. 1 team in the country — have lost four of their final six games. Perhaps even more alarming, three of those were at the traditionally impenetrable Mackey Arena. This one hit a little harder: It was senior night for Braden Smith, Fletcher Loyer, and Trey Kaufman-Renn, three pillars of the Purdue program (Loyer set the program record for most 3’s made in a career), but the scoreboard did not match what that core had earned over its four years.
The Boilers defense is a recurring issue. Wisconsin scored an absurd 1.48 points per possession, piling on a unit that lacks athleticism and versatility. The Badgers shot a scorching 18-for-34 from deep, but Purdue doesn’t force turnovers and allowed 61.1 percent shooting inside the arc.
This result should impact both teams’ seeding. Prior to today, our Joe Rexrode had Wisconsin as a No. 8 seed and Purdue as a No. 3 seed. After this, the Badgers should be free of the perils of the 8/9 game, while Purdue may drop to the No. 4 line. — Jim Root
A bad day for the bubble
Arguably the biggest winners on Saturday were teams that did not play, such as VCU and Santa Clara. None of the teams with the biggest chances to alter their fates could quite get the result needed to catch the selection committee’s attention.
Huge opportunities
Early in the day, both Virginia Tech (at archrival Virginia) and Oklahoma State (hosting Houston) had massive Q1A opportunities to significantly bolster their resumes. Both teams were in range and battled, but neither was able to secure the needle-moving victory they so desperately needed.
The Hokies lost 76-72 in Charlottesville, unable to sweep their rivals after a thrilling triple-overtime victory back on New Year’s Eve. The Cowboys fell 82-75 despite trailing by 1 with 1:50 remaining. Both teams began the day on the outside looking in for the NCAA Tournament, and close losses do them no favors.
In the same vein, New Mexico barely came up short at Utah State, falling to the Aggies 94-90. The Lobos defense, traditionally their bedrock, could not contain the USU attack, leaving New Mexico squarely on the bubble entering the Mountain West tournament. On the other side, that victory clinched the outright Mountain West regular-season title for Utah State. The Aggies already were likely locked into a bid, but they can now rest easy.
Auburn added to the bubble misery with a blowout loss at archrival Alabama. The Tigers have been one of the most polarizing teams on the bubble thanks to their high quantity of losses (15 now), contrasted with their elite strength of schedule. If and when Steven Pearl’s team adds another loss in the SEC tournament, it will attempt to be the first team ever to make the field with 16 losses before the NCAA Tournament.
Auburn has a difficult road ahead to the NCAA Tournament following its loss to Alabama. (Brandon Sumrall / Getty Images)
Coin flips
Ohio State’s mini-surge to the postseason continued on Saturday, as the Buckeyes handled Indiana 91-78. Jake Diebler’s squad has won three in a row to end the season, and it may be in regardless of what happens next week in the Big Ten tournament.
Indiana’s fate is far murkier. The Hoosiers have a couple of headlining wins (Purdue, Wisconsin), but the rest of their resume is shockingly thin. With a 5-13 record against the top two quadrants and a wins-above-bubble that will likely fall outside the top 50, Indiana is almost certainly not a tournament team as of today. IU will need multiple wins in the Big Ten tournament to have a realistic chance on Selection Sunday.
Cincinnati also saw a huge chance slip through its grasp. The Bearcats have been charging hard down the home stretch, but a 73-63 loss at TCU in a winnable Q1 game stunts that momentum. The Bearcats have still won six of their past eight, but results over the rest of the season have pushed their resume metrics well outside the traditional range for inclusion. At this point, UC needs the committee to buy the “we are a different team with Jizzle James” argument while also adding to its resume at the Big 12 tournament. Otherwise, the surge will be too little, too late.
In the SEC, Texas A&M survived a marathon at LSU, beating the Tigers 94-91 in triple overtime. The Aggies were already trending toward being in the field, but another SEC road win should clinch their status. Even a loss to kick off the SEC tournament should not pull Bucky McMillan’s team beyond the bubble.
The darker side of toss-up games devoured multiple bubble teams. The ACC felt the squeeze most acutely, as Cal, NC State and SMU all lost winnable games when they badly needed one to go through the hoop. Cal lost at Wake Forest 80-73; NC State fell at home to Stanford 85-84; SMU got walloped at Florida State 91-78.
The Golden Bears are in the worst position of the trio and will fall short unless they can make a run at the ACC tournament. Both the Wolfpack and the Mustangs remain in the mix, but their current trajectories give the selection committee easy reasons to leave them out. NC State has lost six of its past seven, while SMU has dropped four consecutive contests.
Like NC State, Texas took a potentially harmful home loss to Red River rival Oklahoma, 88-85 in overtime. In an ordinary year, the Longhorns might be in serious trouble near the cutline. This season, though, they might feel fortunate to have so many other bubble hopefuls dropping games on the season’s final weekend. Sean Miller’s first season in Austin has not gone perfectly by any measure, but Texas may still sneak into the NCAA Tournament. — Jim Root
Unranked BYU upsets Texas Tech
Trailing by as many as 13, BYU got a monster effort from sophomore guard Robert Wright III, who scored 23 of his 27 points in the second half to lead the comeback against No. 10 Texas Tech, topping the Red Raiders 82-76 on senior night in Provo.
AJ Dybantsa added 21, and the unranked Cougars withstood a 3-point barrage from Tech — the Red Raiders hit 16 from deep — to pull out the victory. Trailing by 9 with 4:16 to play, Tech reeled off a 9-0 run to tie the score at 75-75, but managed just one point the final 1:46.
It was Tech’s fifth game without All-American forward JT Toppin, who tore his ACL Feb. 17 and is out for the season. Without Toppin, the Red Raiders have to play much smaller, and Saturday night, that took its toll: BYU won the rebounding battle 41-34, including 20 offensive boards that the Cougars turned into 20 second-chance points.
The win helps bolster BYU’s tournament resume, much-needed for a Cougars team that’s been falling down the seed line. — Lindsay Schnell
Duquesne’s 30-point comeback
How’s this for unexpected: After trailing by 30 — 30! — points, Duquesne came all the way back against Richmond, winning on a buzzer-beating tip-in from senior forward Dave Dixon to cap a wild senior day in Pittsburgh.
Richmond shot 67 percent from the field the first half, building its 30-point lead by the 6:43 mark. Duquesne managed to close the gap to 21 at halftime, but still trailed 77-66 with 3:11 to play. Then the Dukes reeled off 13 unanswered points, 7 of which came from senior guard Tarence Guinyard. Tied at 77-77 with 16 seconds left, Guinyard missed a 3 out of a timeout, but Dixon came in from the weak side to tip in the game-winner and set off a frenzied celebration.
With the win, the Dukes became just the fourth team in NCAA Division I history to come back from 30 or more. Alex Williams led the Dukes with 22 points, while Dixon added 17 points and 11 rebounds. Guinyard scored 16.
Duquesne trailed by 30 POINTS in this game. THIS. IS. MARCH. https://t.co/iJNLxyT1Gh pic.twitter.com/l9l58DLDOD
— NCAA Buzzer Beaters & Game Winners (@NCAABuzzerBters) March 7, 2026