Back in October 2023, we posted a list of contenders for the men’s NCAA Tournament title in basketball, and it featured both the Connecticut Huskies and the Purdue Boilermakers in the first-tier list of teams with the probable/”best” chances to win it all. We explained why at the time, using both past precedent and math probabilities to determine which schools had the best chance(s) to cut down the March Madness nets.

We followed this initial projection up with an update in February 2024, when there was a big enough data pile to sort through and assess the same: which teams had the best shot to win it all. Lo and behold, UConn and Purdue were still in the short list of 6 top-tier teams most likely to win the NCAA title. With the Huskies’ 75-60 victory in the championship game last night, it looks like this formula we have works.

Keep this in mind next fall when we repeat this exercise, as we have over the years, to demonstrate that despite the randomness of March Madness and the brackets, there are always only a handful of teams that fit the sabermetric profile of champions. Individual matchups in the tourney always matter, but in the end, it’s usually (if not always) the same suspects we’ve had on the smart watch all along that win the title.

Remember our motto: often wrong, yet never in doubt!