Baylor Earns No. 1 Seed and No. 2 Overall Ranking; Bears Face Hartford Friday

Baylor earned the first No. 1 seed of the Scott Drew era and will take on No. 16 seed Hartford on Friday. The Bears are the No. 2 overall seed.

If Baylor wins, it will battle the winner of North Carolina-Wisconsin on Sunday.

Other seeds in the region: No. 2 Ohio State, No. 3 Arkansas, No. 4 Purdue, No. 5 Villanova, No. 6 Texas Tech, No. 7 Florida, No. 10 Virginia Tech, No. 11 Utah State, No. 12 Winthrop, No. 13 UNT, No. 14 Colgate and No. 15 Oral Roberts.

We’ll know game times, location and network later.

The NCAA Tournament is now Friday-Monday for the first and second round. The first round used to start on Thursday.

Gonzaga earned the No. 1 overall seed.

There’s still a chance for a replacement team if a team can’t play because of COVID-19. But teams only need five players to compete. If a team withdraws, the next team replaces them. So if Baylor’s opponent withdraws, the Bears would play a replacement team. The bracket is not re-seeded to accommodate a replacement.

All rounds of the NCAA Tournament are in Indianapolis and surrounding cities.

The Bears will head to Indianapolis shortly. Their traveling party contains a limited number of folks who are tested daily.

I’d be absolutely shocked if COVID-19 impacted Baylor’s ability to compete in this tournament.

I love this bracket for Baylor. They avoided Loyola and Connecticut, two threats on the 8-9 line.