UH is No. 3 overall seed in bracket preview

Selection committee’s projection has Cougars sitting atop South Regional

The University of Houston was the No. 3 overall seed in the NCAA Tournament men’s basketball selection committee’s bracket preview Saturday, setting up the possibility of playing in a regional close to home.

UH was the No. 1 seed in the South Regional, which plays the second weekend (Sweet 16 and Elite Eight) at American Airlines Center in Dallas.

“Different league, same results,” committee chairman Charles McClelland, the Southwestern Athletic Conference commissioner and former athletic director at Texas Southern, said during the CBS preview show.

This was the eighth consecutive year the NCAA has revealed the top 16 seeds. UH has been among the top seeds in three of the last six years, including a No. 1 seed in 2023.

“We’ve won too much to get excited about winning,” UH coach Kelvin Sampson said about being a No. 1 seed following the third-ranked Cougars’ 82-61 win over Texas at Fertitta Center. “I hope you don’t take that the wrong way. We expect to win, and being a one seed … I don’t know, it just doesn’t matter to me.”

The other No. 1 seeds: Purdue (Midwest), defending champion Connecticut (East) and Arizona (West).

Purdue was the No. 1 overall seed.

North Carolina, Tennessee, Marquette and Kansas were the No. 2 seeds.

The 3-seeds were Alabama, Baylor, Iowa State and Duke.

Auburn, San Diego State, Illinois and Wisconsin were the 4-seeds.

Considered the top basketball conference in the country, the Big 12 accounted for four of the top 16 seeds.

Along with UH, the South Regional included Marquette, Alabama and Illinois.

McClelland said all 12 committee members had the same exact order for the top four seeds.

“Parity is a word that gets thrown around a lot, but I believe we have seen much more of it than in most years, which makes me think we are in for a wild ride down the stretch and as we get to March Madness,” he said.

At 22-3 and tied with Iowa State for first place in the Big 12, the Cougars ranked first nationally in the NCAA Evaluation Tool (NET), No. 3 in both major polls and are 10-3 in Quadrant 1 and 2 games, a key metric used to decide postseason seeding.

UH’s seed in the early preview has held the previous two times, when the Cougars were a No. 3 seed in 2019 and No. 1 last season.

“If the history of the Bracket Preview Show is an indicator, these four teams will be prime candidates to be No. 1 seeds next month,” McClelland said.

This was the only mock bracket preview of the season in advance of Selection Sunday on March 17.

The Final Four will be played April 6 and 8 at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz.