Miami (OH) deserves to be in the NCAA Tournament, even if it means Auburn is out
By David Wasson
Published:
The NCAA Tournament is the most beautiful invention in sports.
I’ll happily fight anyone who wants to argue the majesty of the Super Bowl or the World Cup final or even the Olympic men’s 100-meter dash. I’ll gladly debate the merits of March Madness over a World Series or Stanley Cup Game 7 or a back-9 Masters Sunday charge all day long.
The NCAA Tournament is beautiful and magical and brutal and sudden – a cruel mistress that both tempts and torments with buzzer-beaters, upsets, one-weekend wonders and One Shining Moment.
But alas, one thing the NCAA Tournament isn’t is democratic. No matter how you slice it, there are 37 at-large bids up for grabs come Sunday night when the 68-team bracket is unveiled to the world. The simple math dictates that 31 spots go to conference champions big and small and the majority of the field left to the whims of the fabled and secretive NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Tournament selection committee.
Ah yes, Selection Sunday. Every year, pundits and bracketologists (what a résumé title, by the way!) pore over NET rankings and all sorts of other metrics to try and make sense of an ecosphere made of up teams that play in wildly varying conferences against wildly varying opponents.
This Sunday’s selection process, undoubtedly, will be headlined by one team: The Miami (OH) RedHawks.
Why, you ask?
Because the RedHawks lost a single game.
That’s right, America. The Cardiac RedHawks finally saw their personal Cinderella clock strike midnight earlier this week in the MAC Tournament. That loss was on the heels of Miami (OH) unspooling a perfect 31-0 regular season – becoming only the fifth team in the 21st century to attain perfection in the regular season.
But unlike the Saint Joseph’s and Wichita States and Kentuckys and Gonzagas of the recent past, Miami (OH) is seemingly under a very real threat of not making the NCAA Tournament… simply because UMass cracked the code 87-83 on Thursday afternoon.
Noted bracketologist (what a gig!) Joe Lunardi keeps bouncing the RedHawks from his “Last Four In” to “First Four Out” lists with such regularity you’d think he was trying to win a bar bet. The team that is on the other side of all that Miami (OH) back-and-forth? Auburn.
Will Miami (OH) or Auburn make the NCAA Tournament? Here are the Kalshi odds:
We give you that gigantic windup to arrive at the following red-hot take: Miami (OH) needs to be in the NCAA Tournament field… even if it means leaving Auburn out.
Cue up the outrage, War Eagle Nation – though getting bent out of shape over a 17-16 team missing the Big Dance in favor of a 31-1 team that has caught the nation’s attention is one that likely won’t find much traction outside Lee County.
Does the NCAA Tournament really need Bruce Pearl’s nepotistic son Steven squeaking his mediocre Tigers team into a potential First Four berth over a group of scrappy RedHawks that won every game on their freaking schedule? Pearl the Senior wants you to think so, of course, seeing as how Auburn plays an SEC schedule full of heavyweights like Florida and Alabama – while Miami (OH) plays a MAC schedule with notables like all 3 of the basketball-playing directional Michigan schools (Central, Eastern and Western).
“If we’re selecting the 68 best teams, then Miami (OH) is going to have to win their tournament to qualify as a champion, because as an at-large, they are not one of the best teams in the country, and that’s going to be a difficult choice for the committee,” Pearl opined on TNT in late February.
Listen, we understand the Auburn perspective of the argument. The Tigers did knock off the SEC champion Gators before a late-season swoon that featured 8 losses in 11 games to land them squarely in this mess. Yes, 8 of Auburn’s 16 losses were to then-ranked teams and 2 more are to current Top 25 squads. But just beat Ole Miss at home on Feb. 28 or take care of business 2 weeks earlier on the road at Mississippi State and we aren’t having this conversation.
Conversely, Miami (OH) was playing with fire long before UMass finally caused the first burn. But even after the 87-83 upset loss, the RedHawks sport the best shooting percentage in the nation at 52.6% and are ninth in 3-point percentage at 39.3%. And at 90.9 points per game, Miami (OH) trails only Alabama in scoring average.
What about strength of record, you say? How about 21st in the country. And RPI, the old model used to select NCAA Tournament teams before the NET rankings? The RedHawks check in at 28th. History also favors them, as no team with at least 28 wins has missed March Madness since the tournament expanded to 64 teams back in 1985.
On the flip side, Miami (OH) is No. 54 in the NET rankings, the RedHawks’ lackluster strength of schedule ranks 256th and their KenPom rating (whatever that is…) is 93 – surrounded by teams that have practically no shot of making the Big Dance without an automatic qualifier.
Conversely, Auburn’s strength of schedule is 15th in the nation, 38th in the NET rankings and 39th in KenPom (whatever that is…)
Which brings us to the following, pivotal, question: Should the NCAA Tournament field be made up of the best, or most deserving, teams? Do the 31 victories Miami (OH) piled up mean more than Auburn’s 17? And do Auburn’s 16 losses weigh more in its favor than Miami (OH)’s 1?
The answer, at least from this keyboard, is clear: Miami (OH) deserves to hear its name called Sunday night. The RedHawks deserve to go dancing. The 2026 NCAA Tournament is better off with an exciting Miami (OH) team than it is with a mediocre Auburn one.
Though, come to think of it, there is one solution that will truly satisfy everyone…
Auburn vs. Miami (OH) in the First Four.
C’mon, selection committee, make it happen!
An APSE national award-winning writer and editor, David Wasson has almost four decades of experience in the print journalism business in Florida and Alabama. His work has also appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and several national magazines and websites. His Twitter handle: @JustDWasson.
