The 2021 Men’s NCAA Basketball Tournament is now over, and the Baylor Bears are your 2021 champions. With the 2021 season now officially complete, it is time to look back and reflect on the year that was. The subject for today is one that has always fascinated me: how to quantify the performance of coaches and teams in the NCAA Tournament.
PASE Yourself
There are dozens are different ways to measure performance in March. The most obvious ones include stats like total wins, overall win percentages, Final Fours, and national titles. The Spartans and head coach Tom Izzo are in the top-10 in all four of these categories in the modern era (which I define as from 1979 on, which was the first year the teams were seeded and that the tournament expanded to beyond 32 teams).