Giant Killers: South Region

West | South | East | Midwest

Last night, we brought you the news that the NCAA selection committee, working from an applicant pool already weakened by conference tournament upsets, has handed down a weak field of Giant Killers for 2014. Nevertheless, it's time to move beyond our list of the 10 most likely round of 64 upsets and go prospecting in this year's brackets.

For each of the four regions, we'll break down the six Giant vs. Killer matchups. (Remember, a Giant Killer is any team that beats an opponent seeded at least five spots higher. See our full methodology here for more details.)

Per tradition, we have divided the games among four categories: Best Bets, Worth a Long Look, Not Completely Crazy and Stay Away. We can't tell you exactly how to play your brackets; that depends on how much upsets are worth in your pool. But we can give you the odds of upsets, based on statistical analysis that begins with teams' basic power ratings and layers in their "special sauce" (their statistical similarity to past Davids and Goliaths) and adjusts further for the matchup of their playing styles.

Stick with us. We will cover the Midwest and South on Monday, the East and West on Tuesday, and look ahead to future rounds on Wednesday.

In the South, we find no Best Bets, just a series of intriguingly weak matchups ...

Worth A Long Look

No. 5 VCU Rams (Giant rating: 87.2, on a scale from zero to 100) vs.
No. 12 Stephen F. Austin Lumberjacks (Giant Killer rating: 29.4)
Upset Chance: 24.9 percent

We spotted the Lumberjacks in our spreadsheets a month ago, and have spent a good chunk of our time since then patting ourselves on the back. They force turnovers at a staggering rate (24.4 percent of opponent possessions, ranking third in the NCAA); at the same time, they protect the ball, and the combination drags out the length of their possessions to an average of 20.5 seconds and slows the pace of their games (ranking 304th). They shoot 3s frequently and effectively, and despite having no starters taller than 6-foot-6, they pull down 38.5 percent of missed shots (ranking 11th). It's all an amazing Giant Killing combination, one that should amp Stephen F. Austin by nearly 10 points in the NCAA tournament.

The Giant they're facing, however, is VCU, a longtime crush of our model as a Killer and now as an overdog. By now, you've heard of Briante Weber, whom we have been hyping since he was a freshman; this season, he led the country in steal percentage (6.7) for the third straight season, and with seven different kinds of presses, VCU forces more steals and turnovers than any team. The Rams also clamp down on the perimeter (opponents shoot just 30.1 percent on 3s, ranking 11th), and have improved their offensive rebounding during the season. Their overall style is very effective against Killers, making it hard to generate points in bunches. VCU's shooting is nowhere near as precise as it was last season -- just average from outside, and only 45.5 percent on 2-pointers. But that figures to be more of a problem in later rounds than against the Lumberjacks, who are allowing an effective field goal percentage of 50.2 percent (ranking 198th). As a 5-seed, VCU can't be a Killer this year, and as a Giant, it's an awfully tough matchup for the Killer we liked best as a comer. Looks like the NCAA has finally found a way to use our model's favorite team against us.

Not Completely Crazy

No. 4 UCLA Bruins (62.0) vs. No. 13 Tulsa Golden Hurricane (5.2)
Upset Chance: 17.0 percent

There's a common theme in this region: Weak Giants face even weaker Killers, often from a conference that could have produced a far more dangerous alternative. In this case, we get Tulsa instead of a pair of nasty Giants we'd been tracking all season from Conference USA: Southern Miss and Louisiana Tech. Don't expect the Golden Hurricane to represent their fallen comrades well.

It's rare to find an upstart that even reaches the tourney while struggling in both offensive rebounding and 3-point shooting. But Tulsa pulls off the rare double whammy. Tulsa grabs only 30.1 percent of its own misses, and not nearly enough of those bricks come from deep range: Only 31.7 percent of their shots are 3s. Then again, they make only 32.5 percent of them, so maybe that's sound strategy. Tulsa does offset some of those offensive woes with the country's No. 28 defense, and it's a GK-style outfit, forcing turnovers on 20.4 percent of possessions. But top thief Shaquille Harrison will have to turn several swipes into layups to keep up with UCLA's offense.

The Bruins, though, are also the reason why an upset is at least somewhat possible. UCLA has the 14th-ranked offense in the country, but safe Giants tend to track down a high percentage of their own misses. At 30.2 percent, the Bruins don't, and that's a key reason why the model assigns them a negative "secret sauce." It's still likely that UCLA will survive, but as 4-versus-13 matchups go, this isn't the longest of shots.

No. 6 Ohio State Buckeyes (81.5) vs. No. 11 Dayton Flyers (16.4)
Upset Chance: 14.0 percent

Any opponent was going to have a tough time meeting the Buckeyes in a 6-11 game: Ohio State is about five points stronger than Baylor, North Carolina or the average 6-seed since 2007, not to mention more than nine points better than UMass, according to our model's basic power rankings. Thad Matta's squad lacks the outside shooting touch it had in 2013, but it still blankets opponents, giving up just 89.4 points per 100 possessions after adjusting for the strength of its opponents (ranking fourth in the NCAA). And yet we can't help but note that this is a place where a well-placed mid-major at-large bid -- a Louisiana Tech, say -- could have dented the brackets, the way La Salle and Oregon did last year. Instead, here comes Dayton, whose offense is legit (113.4 points per 100 possessions, ranking 30th), but who's below average at stopping opponents from shooting inside as well as outside, and doesn't take many 3s or force many turnovers. With the Flyers lacking the variability that characterizes successful underdogs, our model just doesn't see them as likely to close the gap with Ohio State. One matchup worth watching: Dayton SG Jordan Sibert, hitting on 44 percent of bombs this season vs. the Buckeyes' perimeter defense (allowing opponents to shoot just 29.7 percent on 3s, ranking seventh).

Stay Away

No. 3 Syracuse Orange (83.1) vs. No. 14 Western Michigan Broncos (4.4)
Upset Chance: 6.3 percent

Only three weeks ago, we trumpeted the Orange's safe profile as a Giant. Since then, Syracuse has seen its Giant rating decline consistently, making the idea of an upset shift from unfathomable to somewhat possible. Luckily for the Orange, they drew Western Michigan, which is not equipped to test them.

The skills necessary to shred Syracuse's 2-3 zone are precisely the weapons GKs use to topple Goliaths. And the Broncos don't have them in their arsenal. Cuse is exceedingly vulnerable to strong offensive rebounding teams, but despite the presence of Shayne Whittington and his 6-11, 245-pound frame, the Broncos grab only 31.4 percent of their own misses. You can also beat Syracuse -- and many a Giant -- with hot, frequent 3-point shooting, but Western Michigan generates only 24.4 percent of its offense from beyond the arc (227th in the country). That doesn't bode well for Thursday.

No. 2 Kansas Jayhawks (88.2) vs. No. 15 Eastern Kentucky Colonels (18.5)
Upset Chance: 5.6 percent

If our model could weep or drink, it would be crying in its beer over this matchup. We had an eye on Eastern Kentucky way back when its extreme stats lit up our spreadsheets last year, and then this season, the Colonels bombed their way to the OVC championship. Their defense, relentlessly pressuring, forces bushels of turnovers (24.2 percent of opponent possessions, ranking fourth in the country), while their offense, relentlessly passing, opens shots on the outside (38.6 percent on 3s, ranking 28th) and under the basket (56.2 percent on 2-point attempts, ranking second). Eastern Kentucky's aggression constantly puts opponents on the line (55.3 percent of points on free throws, ranking 343rd) and lands the Colonels in foul trouble. And their lack of size (effective height: minus-3.0 inches) leaves them markedly vulnerable to box outs and blocks. But on the whole, their tradeoffs threaten to make them a much more lethal Killer -- against the right kind of Giant. The Colonels are an example -- in fact, the only halfway decent example this season -- of a "Steph Curry Killer," the kind of David that uses sharpshooting to fell a Goliath. And they badly needed to face a Generic Giant, an opponent without dominant rebounding tendencies, to have a shot at an upset.

Instead, they got Kansas. The Jayhawks are tall, blast opponents with 55.6 percent inside shooting (ranking eighth in the nation), and seize 37.1 percent of offensive rebounds. They've also played the hardest schedule in the country, while Eastern Kentucky's SOS ranks 301st. The sad truth is that Killers similar to Eastern Kentucky have beaten Giants similar to Kansas just twice in 13 tries since 2007, and never by overcoming a gap as yawning as the canyon between the Jayhawks and Colonels. Eastern Kentucky is always fun to watch, but sometimes the best advice is to avoid picking an upset that's not going to happen.

No. 1 Florida Gators (91.0) vs. No. 16 Albany Great Danes (1.7)
or No. 16 Mount St. Mary's Mountaineers (3.6)
Albany's Upset Chance: 1.5 percent
Mount St. Mary's Upset Chance: 1.4 percent

What do you get when you cross the best team in the country with a pair of teams that are barely tourney-worthy? Some really, really, really long upset odds. Only Louisville and Arizona have better power ratings than Florida, according to our model. And the Gators play just as a Giant should by rebounding aggressively at both ends and forcing boatloads of turnovers.

And Albany or Mount St. Mary's? Yikes. The Great Danes play really slowly (good), but rarely shoot 3-pointers (bad). They also didn't beat a single top-150 team in our model's power rankings before somehow knocking off Vermont in the AEC tournament. But they might beat Mount St. Mary's, because that juggernaut only reached .500 by winning its final four games, and features the 287th-ranked defense in the country. Someday, a 16-seed will take out a top dog. It just won't be either of these two squads.