Geography Major Isn’t Worth Much

Can somebody please explain how the NCAA tournament selection committee picks the teams for the “regional” brackets?

USC is in the South Regional? Well, the Trojans are from Southern California, so maybe that explains it. And North Carolina Wilmington is definitely from the South, but they travel to Sacramento to face the Trojans? Who thought that up?

UCLA is in the West Regional, so that makes geographic sense. But the Bruins play in Pittsburgh? That’s not West, unless you live in Philly. And the Bruins’ first opponent is Mississippi. If the New Orleans Saints and Atlanta Falcons can be in the NFC West, I guess this makes sense.

Tony Cortese

Los Angeles

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The only sense I could make of the NCAA brackets was when I saw that Sacramento is in the South and the Midwest. That explains why the bureaucrats in the state capital never pay any attention to the interests of anybody in the Pacific time zone. They’re two or three time zones away, so by the time somebody calls for help they’re already out to lunch. And they never come back.

Allen E. Kahn

Playa del Rey

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I don’t wish to belittle those basketball teams in Duke’s section of the NCAA tournament draw, but how fairly done is a selection process that makes it so obviously easy for any one team to waltz its way into the Final Four?

It appears that either the selection committee was incompetent and the regional selections were accidental, or the selection committee was competent and the regional selections were deliberately skewed.

In either event, please award those august gentlemen prescription eyewear. And, please, let’s not hear that the selections were just “luck of the draw.”

Lewis Redding

Arcadia

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The selection committee’s bias against the West can be easily quantified by looking at the average RPI of the top eight seeds in each bracket. In the West’s lower bracket, where they stuck Gonzaga, the average RPI of the 2, 3, 6 and 7 seeds is 11.5. In the East upper bracket, where they put favored Maryland, the average RPI of the 1, 4, 5 and 8 seeds is 23.0--or exactly double the West lower bracket! The committee claims it bases its actions on RPI, not the polls, but this shows the teams in the West got cheated if you look only at RPI.

Bill Waterhouse

Long Beach

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If Stanford is so opposed to the Pacific 10 tournament, then I suggest that the Cardinal refuse the invitation next year. This will save the alumni from wasting money on tickets to see such an uninspired effort. With no band, cheerleaders, mascot, etc., Stanford showed a total disregard for the great college atmosphere shown by the other teams at Staples Center.

R.J. Johnson

Palos Verdes Estates