I clearly have some learning to do about this process. I was prompted by a headline that reads "Mount St. Mary's advances to face Duke" to complain about how the poor First Four teams, after struggling to get into the tournament, must immediately face the #1 teams in each conference.
But then I took a closer look and found that two of the First Four teams do not in fact suffer that fate. As a matter of fact, an even closer look reveals that those two teams are not ranked #16 as I would have expected, but each at #11, thereby matching them with less elite opponents in the first round.
So, if they were ranked at #11, why were they playing in the First Four games in the first place? I would think the #15 teams, Bryant and Robert Morris, would be playing the two #16 teams.
