INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Duke
was seeded No. 1 for the NCAA tournament for a record fifth straight year
Sunday, joined atop the regional brackets by top-ranked Kansas, Maryland and
Cincinnati.
Maryland earned its first top spot, despite losing in the
Atlantic Coast Conference tournament to unranked
North Carolina State. Kansas also did not win its conference
tournament, losing in the title game Sunday to Oklahoma. The Terrapins and
Jayhawks won their regular-season league championships.
Only Cincinnati won both
its regular season and tournament titles. Duke
won the ACC tournament.
For the first time, the NCAA selection committee allowed
teams — grouped in four-team ``pods'' — to stay closer to home for the first
and second rounds before returning to their assigned regionals.
Maryland (26-4) was seeded first in the East and will play
in nearby Washington on Friday against the winner of Tuesday's opening-round
game between Alcorn State of the Southwestern Athletic Conference and Siena
of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference.
The other matchup in that pod is eighth-seeded Wisconsin
against ninth-seeded St. John's.
The other four teams in that part of the East Regional
bracket will play Thursday in St. Louis, Mo., with fourth-seeded Kentucky
playing Valparaiso and fifth-seeded Marquette going against Tulsa.
The lower part of the bracket features second-seeded
Connecticut against Hampton in Washington on Friday, along with
seventh-seeded North Carolina State
against Michigan State, which has been in the last three Final Fours.
In Chicago on Friday, third-seeded Georgia meets Murray
State and sixth-seeded Texas Tech and coach Bob Knight play Southern
Illinois.
In the Midwest Regional, Kansas (29-3), which had its
15-game winning streak snapped by Oklahoma in the Big 12 tournament
championship game on Sunday, will play Holy Cross on Thursday in St. Louis.
The other game in that pod is eighth-seeded Stanford against Western
Kentucky.
The other half of the upper bracket has fourth-seeded
Illinois staying in the area against San Diego State on Friday, while
fifth-seeded Florida faces Creighton.
Oregon, the Pac-10 regular-season champion, is seeded second
and will play Montana in Sacramento, Calif., on Thursday, with
seventh-seeded Wake Forest against
Pepperdine in the other game.
The other half of the lower part of the bracket is in Dallas
on Friday, with third-seeded Mississippi State against McNeese State, and
sixth-seeded Texas facing Boston College.
Duke (29-3) will open
defense of its national championship as the No. 1 team in the South, playing
Winthrop on Thursday in Greenville,
S.C., while eighth-seeded Notre Dame faces
Charlotte.
The other pod in that bracket will be in Sacramento on
Thursday, with fourth-seeded Southern California against
North Carolina-Wilmington, and
fifth-seeded Indiana facing Utah.
Alabama is seeded second in the South and will also play in
Greenville, meeting Florida Atlantic, which is making its first tournament
appearance. The other game in that pod features seventh-seeded Oklahoma
State against Kent State.
Pittsburgh, which lost to Connecticut in the Big East
championship game, gets to stay home as the No. 3 seed, playing Central
Connecticut State, which has the nation's longest current winning streak, on
Friday. The other game features another in-state team, Ivy League champion
Pennsylvania, against sixth-seeded California.
Cincinnati (30-3), the
only team with 30 wins entering the tournament, is No. 1 in the West
Regional. The Bearcats open against Boston University in Pittsburgh on
Friday, with eighth-seeded UCLA facing Mississippi in the other game.
The other part of the top half of the bracket will be in
Albuquerque, N.M., on Thursday. Fourth-seeded Ohio State, the Big Ten
tournament champion, plays Davidson and
fifth-seeded Miami faces Missouri.
Oklahoma's first game after the upset of Kansas will be as a
No. 2 seed in Dallas on Friday against Illinois-Chicago, with seventh-seeded
Xavier facing Hawaii in the other game.
The other pod in the lower half features third-seeded
Arizona against Cal-Santa Barbara in Albuquerque, along with sixth-seeded
Gonzaga facing Wyoming.