As of December 27th at 9 AM E.S.T. Indiana basketball finds themselves down to a 5-seed in Joe Lunardi’s latest ESPN Bracketology update.
Going 3-3 in December after getting off to a 7-0 start with wins over Xavier and North Carolina, the Hoosiers have forced themselves out of a top-three seed and now land as a 5-seed in the East Region, facing off against 12-seeded Sam Houston State in the first round of the 2023 NCAA Tournament.
Joining the Hoosiers and Bearkats in the East Region is 1-seed UConn facing 16-seed Colgate, 2-seed Tennessee facing 15-seed Furman, 3-seed Baylor facing 14-seed UMass Lowell, 4-seed Virginia facing 13-seed Dayton, 6-seed Maryland facing 11-seed Kent State, 7-seed Virginia Tech facing 10-seed Creighton, and 8-seed TCU facing 9-seed San Diego State.
If that above is what the Hoosiers have to get through in order to reach their first Final Four in over 20 years, I give Indiana and Coach Woodson a small chance of that happening.
The Big Ten has the most teams (10) currently landing in the Big Dance for 2023 according to Joe Lunardi, who has Purdue as the No. 1 overall seed, Wisconsin as a 5-seed, Maryland and Ohio State as 6-seeds, Illinois as. a 7-seed, Michigan State as a 10-seed, Penn State and Rutgers (play-in) as 11-seeds, and Iowa as a 12-seed (play-in).
The teams that Indiana has already battled with this year are in pretty good standing so far, with Xavier landing as a 5-seed, North Carolina as a 4-seed, Kansas and Arizona as 1-seeds, and Rutgers as a 12-seed. The Hoosiers are 2-3 against current teams landing in Lunardi’s 2023 NCAA Tournament.