Who’s up and who’s down as the 2021 men’s NCAA Basketball Tournament enters the round of 16:
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UP: The Pac-12. When Bill Walton projected five teams from the “conference of champions” to make the Final Four, it seemed ludicrous even beyond the mathematical impossibility.
Nobody was talking about the Pac-12 as the nation’s best hoops league. By acclimation of the hoops talking heads, the Big Ten and the Big 12 were battling for that designation.
Well, lo and behold, so far in the 2021 Big Dance, the left coast is the best coast.
The Pac-12 stands a robust 9-1 after the opening rounds of the NCAA tourney. It has four teams among the 16 remaining.
With USC and Oregon set to face off in the West Region semifinals, the league is guaranteed at least one team in the round of eight.
So strong is the Pac-12 mojo, Mick Cronin — Mick Cronin! — has already coached UCLA to three NCAA tourney wins.
That’s the same Mick Cronin who had coached in 11 prior Big Dances without ever winning three games in one tourney.
For Kentucky Wildcats backers, the MVP of the NCAA Tournament so far is Pac-12 Cinderella Oregon State.
Coach Wayne Tinkle’s Beavers (19-12) had to win the Pac-12 Tournament to make the NCAA tourney.
When OSU did just that, it knocked UK’s intrastate rival, Louisville, from the field of 68.
In the NCAA first round, Oregon State bounced Kentucky’s SEC rival, Tennessee.
When the Beavers upset Oklahoma State and star freshman Cade Cunningham in the round of 32, it sent Oregon State to the sweet 16 for the first time since 1982.
Of the Pac-12’s blow-torching of the NCAA Tournament field, “we’re obviously putting everybody on notice,” Oregon State’s Tinkle said.
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DOWN: The Big Ten. For every skeptic who feels the Big Ten is persistently over-hyped, this NCAA tourney has been for you.
The Big Ten got nine teams in the 2021 Big Dance. It had two No. 1 seeds (Michigan, Illinois), two No. 2s (Ohio State and Iowa) and a No. 4 (Purdue).
