If the University of Illinois wins March Madness this year, Will Leitch writes that he will run naked through the streets. But if you’re not an alumnus, here’s who to root for in the NCAA tournament with 16 teams left.
I love college basketball more than I should and spend a disturbingly large percentage of my life watching it. And as we head into the second weekend of March Madness, I’m telling you: It has never been better than it is right now.
I keep, and they keep yelling at me for it, which a reasonable person would take to mean it’s possible that they are wrong — but I am not a reasonable person. For the first time since the days of Allen Iverson, the best non-NBA players can all be found in college basketball even if they don’t always stay on the same team like they used to. The explanation for this uptick in quality is simple: Players are finally getting paid. It turns out when you offer to pay people for doing a job, in a business that for decades made everyonedifferent, that following it is different than it was 20 years ago, that we can no longer tell ourselves the lies about college sports that we used to tell ourselves . But that it is different does not mean that it is worse. It means the exact opposite.I’ve put together a harmless, just-playing-around — please do not sic your school’s sub-Reddits on me — ranking of the teams and schools by likability, a hopefully helpful Guide to the Otherwise Unaffiliated. Before we start, I should note that my alma mater, the University of Illinois Fighting Illini, are in the Sweet 16 this year for the first time since I started writing this series. I love this team more than I love just about anything in my life, a pathetic thing to admit even before I tell you that I, every month, for free, just because I think so much about this team that I have to get those words out of my body or I will explode. If Illinois loses, I will run screaming through the streets naked, causing generational trauma that my great-great-grandchildren will never quite be able to shake. My experience of watching their game against Houston on Thursday will be one of a constant, piercing primal scream; I will be clawing at my face until I look likeWhich is to say: It is possible I cannot impartially rank Illinois on the rootability list. So I will not try. Just know that if you root against them my ghost will hunt you down and never allow you, or any of your ancestors, a moment of peace or solace.On the one hand, there’s a lot to like about this team. Twins Cameron and Cayden Boozer — sons of Duke legend Carlos Boozer, who appears with them in an ad in heavy tournament rotation — are good dudes who play together well and seem to have legitimate senses of humor. The team is missing their point guard but admirably holding it together without him. Coach Jon Scheyer is not Coach K. As far as Duke teams go, this is not a particularly hateable one.Danny Hurley is the most disliked coach in college basketball, and I’m not sure it’s close. Hurley isn’t corrupt or anything, or at least not any more corrupt than any other college coach. He’s just a loud, obnoxious bullying loudmouth whowho made a call he didn’t like, “Don’t turn your back on me, I’m the best coach in the sport!” I’m getting grouchy just writing this sentence. This team has won two of the last three titles, and if he wins another one there are going to be Danny Hurleys, Nate Oats seems likely to take his spot as the most disliked SEC coach. Oats caused a stir this year when he brought back G League professional Charles Bediako to play for his team even though he declared for the NBA Draft years ago, therefore throwing the whole structure of college basketball into existential peril. A judge, and Oats quickly moved on without him, not complaining much at all, entirely because it turned out Bediako wasn’t all that good anyway. That’s Oats in a nutshell: He’ll blow up the entire sport if he thinks it will give his team even the slightest of edges, and if it doesn’t work he’ll just shrug and move on like nothing happened until he figures out a way to do it again. Very Bruce Pearl behavior.It speaks to just how much the favorites have dominated this NCAA Tournament, the extent to which it has been ruled by traditional powers that the lowest seed remaining in the tourney, with the No. 11 seed, is freakingone of the richest schools and one of the proudest athletic programs in the country. It’s a major surprise to see them make it this far, but don’t you dare call them an underdog. It’s freakingA surprise entrant in the Sweet 16 — this has not been considered one of the better Tennessee teams in recent years — the Volunteers are led by NBA prospect Nate Ament and coach Rick Barnes, who looks like the 13th candidate onstage at a Republican presidential debate, the responsible, boring one who is obviously going to end up finishing 13th. This is one of the more dutifully dull teams in the tournament, hindered by the undeniable fact that a large percentage of its fansA hated rival of my Illini — so keep that in mind — Iowa is the most surprising team to reach the Sweet 16, thanks to a shocking upset of defending champion Florida in the Round of 32. They’re led by point guard Bennett Stirtz, who grew up in rural Missouri and very much looks it: Imagine what would happen ifwere somehow transported to modern-day basketball, and you’d have Stirtz. Actually, that’s not true: Stirtz and his crew cut might think Chitwood was some kind of hippie.The Cougars had an absolutely heartbreaking loss in the national championship game last year, costing generally respected veteran coach Kelvin Sampson a chance at his first and maybe only national championship. They’re back this year with a team that’s just as good, led by NBA draft phenom Kingston Flemings. They play a hard and rugged style, exhausting teams with their relentless defense, which is something that used to be common in the sport but now feels downright unique. I’d have them ranked higher on this list, but they’re playing my Illini on Thursday in Houston. So if someone could blow air horns outside wherever they’re sleeping on Wednesday night, I’d very much appreciate it.Purdue has an all-time star on their roster, point guard Braden Smith, who just became the NCAA’s all-time leader in assists over the weekend. It’s an impressive achievement, especially considering that Smith is barely six feet tall andthat makes him look like the guy behind the front desk at your local taxidermist. He’s not an actual taxidermist; he just works there, likes to hang around. It’s really his kind of vibe.Fayetteville is the newish home of coach John Calipari, one of the sport’s most polarizing figures, who was run out of Kentucky two years ago despite leading the team to a national championship and four Final Fours. Arkansas is led by the electrifying point guard Darius Acuff Jr., one of the most truly watchable players in the tournament, who doesn’t play a lick of defense and is somehow more enjoyable because of it. He’s going to end up being one of those NBA players who becomes a cult hero immediately; think Jamal Crawford or Vinnie Johnson. Arkansas has not been this much fun since theera. Note: While we are currently living through the most undignified era in presidential history, one thing you can say about the current resident of the Oval Office is that he has never worn this hat, at least not that we know of.yet. So if you have been repulsed by this football program, the current team feels like a warm hug. Coach Dusty May is a Bob Knight protégé whothe famously boorish, rotten Knight taught him; star player Yaxel Lendeborg is the extremely likable son of Dominican national team players, who has somehow only been playing college basketball for six years; and power forward Morez Johnson Jr. has a very amusing bit in which he stands behind the much shorter May during postgame interviews,, and pretends to be part of his security detail. This is Michigan, so surely there’s some sort of secret illuminati scandal we’ll all find out about in a couple of years but, for now, if this outstanding team ends up winning the national championship, you don’t have to feel all that terrible about it.This is one of the best teams in college basketball, and they came into the tourney as the Vegas favorite to win it . They’re generally likable and deserve extra points for having LeBron James’s son Bryce on the team. Wait, you didn’t know LeBron’s son played for Arizona? That’s totally understandable, because Arizona is so good, and so confident in its quality, that it actuallyBryce this season in order for him to learn by watching. You definitely are on a heater when LeBron’s kid comes to your program and you tell him to sit down and be quiet for a year.Tom Izzo has done that thing where he has been around so long that we’ve all come all the way back around to liking him after decades of feeling the opposite. Izzo has witnessed every dramatic change in college basketball since 1995, refused to go along with any of them, and somehow, in the face of skeptics, keeps winning year after year. You gotta admire the little guy, dammit.The local team is making its first Sweet 16 appearance since 1999, a 27-year span that featured all sorts of terrible coaches and, for a while, made you wonder whether this whole program was just an ’80s-era relic. But then they hired Rick Pitino, one of the greatest coaches of all time, who has now taken teams to the Sweet 16 in the 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s, and 2020s. Almost immediately, Pitino has brought them back to the top of the sport. Of course, he was only available because he was banished from Louisville after a succession of scandals, including one in which heand got her pregnant; she would later marry one of his assistant coaches. But hey, who among us? Life’s a rich pageant, you know?, “Who knew that Illinois had so many Serbians?” If this is an issue for you, you may like Iowa State and star point guard Tamin Lipsey, an undersize six-foot-one point guard who grew up in Ames cheering for Iowa State and has become one of the best players in the country for his hometown team. Iowa State is missing one of its stars, All-American Joshua Jefferson, which makes them even easier to root for. The Cyclones are actually a pretty fun underdog, if you can handle the fact that winning will make alum Joni Ernst really, really happy.of college basketball, a former power in one sport that faded but ended up becoming the story of the year in another sport, one they’ve been terrible at for years? Nebraska had never won an NCAA tournament gameuntil Thursday: They’ve now won two, boosted by a riotous fan base that is taking over every arena it has visited, something they’re likely to do in Houston this weekendNebraska is as close to an out-of-nowhere Cinderella as college basketball may be capable of right now. We are allThe First Lady introduced a walking, talking humanoid robot at the White House and breezily suggested it will replace human teachers.If the unpopular and economically damaging conflict drags on, Trump and the GOP are in serious trouble for the midterms.Democrat Emily Gregory will soon be representing President Trump in the Florida statehouse after winning his district in a special election.Strict, often oppressive belief systems governed the lives of the Duggars and the Mormon Wives. We preferred it that way.Trump backed off his threat to obliterate Iran’s energy infrastructure and claims negotiations are underway. Here’s the latest.While border czar Tom Homan has said the ICE agents will be assisting with security, images have circulated showing officers largely standing around.Is the minor excursion very complete, ending in a couple weeks, or just beginning? Here’s the latest on what Trump feels in his bones.For unclear reasons, Trump abruptly gave in on DHS funding. Now, he wants to pack the SAVE Act and other priorities into a second Big Beautiful Bill.Sheriff Chad Bianco’s phony 2025 election “audit” sure looks like an attempt to build MAGA cred in the governor’s race.Banning late-arriving mail ballots wouldn’t be fatal to democracy. But it could boost Trump’s broader assault on voting by mail.The acronym for “Trump Always Chickens Out” was originally about “Liberation Day” tariffs. Now it’s morphed into a broader Trump insult.How the head of one of the city’s biggest landlord lobbies went from smoking hookah with Zohran Mamdani to fighting his housing policies.New York
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