NCAA Tournament Team Scoring Based On Seeds

We run the 2019 NCAA Wrestling Championship seeds through a scoring rubric to see what the team race would look like if chalk prevailed.

Mar 18, 2019 by Andrew Spey

How would the NCAA Tournament team race go if every match went according to seed? That's a good question, and luckily for us, we can answer it, as the NCAA seeding committee has, for the first time in tournament history, seeded all 33 entries per weight class.

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Applying the same method we use to calculate the FloWrestling Team Tournament Top 20, we can reveal what the team scores would be if every bracket went 100% chalk and there were no bonus points or penalty deductions. Those scores are in the table below.

RANK	TEAM	POINTS
1	Penn State	125.5
2	Oklahoma State	84
3	Ohio State	82.5
4	Michigan	66
5	Iowa	63.5
6	Missouri	49
7	Minnesota	42.5
8	Cornell	41.5
9	Rutgers	35.5
9	Northwestern	35.5
9	Lehigh	35.5
12	Virginia Tech	33
13	Northern Iowa	31
13	Arizona State	31
15	Nebraska	30.5
16	Princeton	29
17	NC State	27
18	Illinois	25
19	Wisconsin	23.5
20	Pittsburgh	22
21	Oregon State	21.5
22	Iowa State	20
23	Virginia	16.5
24	Duke	16
25	Lock Haven	15.5
26	North Carolina	12.5
27	Old Dominion	9
28	Stanford	7.5
29	Utah Valley	6.5
29	Purdue	6.5
31	Wyoming	6
32	Oklahoma	4.5
32	North Dakota State	4.5
34	Fresno State	4
34	Central Michigan	4
36	Navy	3.5
36	Army	3.5
38	Ohio	3
38	Drexel	3
38	Campbell	3
41	West Virginia	2.5
41	Michigan State	2.5
43	Penn	2
43	Maryland	2
43	Indiana	2
43	Binghamton	2
47	Rider	1.5
47	Northern Illinois	1.5
47	George Mason	1.5
47	Bucknell	1.5
47	Appalachian State	1.5
52	Buffalo	1
52	American	1
54	VMI	0.5
54	The Citadel	0.5
54	South Dakota State	0.5
54	Kent State	0.5
54	Gardner-Webb	0.5
54	CSU Bakersfield	0.5
54	Cal Poly	0.5
54	Brown	0.5
62	SIU Edwardsville	0
62	Northern Colorado	0
62	Franklin & Marshall	0
62	Edinboro	0
62	Columbia	0
62	Clarion	0
62	Chattanooga	0
62	Bloomsburg	0
62	Air Force	0

With seven wrestlers seeded in the top three, it's no surprise to see Penn State up top. They are the favored to run away with their fourth straight team title, and head coach Cael Sanderson's eighth overall, a double four-peat.

Oklahoma State, despite netting zero points in our projection from #33 seed Joe Smith at 165 and #26 seed Dakota Geer at 184, is favored to battle it out with Ohio State for the runner-up trophy. The final fourth-place team trophy should come down to either Michigan or Iowa.

We can also see how many All-Americans each team would have if everyone wrestled to seed. That table is below.

TEAM	1st	2nd	3rd	4th	5th	6th	7th	8th	TOTAL
Penn State	3	3	1						7
Oklahoma State	2	1	1				2		6
Michigan		1		2	1	1		1	6
Ohio State	1	3			1				5
Iowa	1		1		1	1	1		5
Missouri		1		1	1			1	4
Minnesota			1			2	1		4
Lehigh				1	1			2	4
Virginia Tech			1			1		1	3
Princeton				1	1		1		3
Northern Iowa				1		1		1	3
Cornell	1				1			1	3
Wisconsin				1			1		2
Virginia					1		1		2
Rutgers	1		1						2
Pittsburgh				1				1	2
Oregon State				1		1			2
Northwestern	1		1						2
Nebraska		1					1		2
NC State					1		1		2
Iowa State						1		1	2
Illinois				1		1			2
Arizona State			2						2
Stanford								1	1
Old Dominion							1		1
North Carolina						1			1
Lock Haven					1				1
Duke			1						1

But, as explained, that's if literally everything goes according to chalk and there are no bonus points or penalty deductions, and the chances of that happening are precisely nil.

So what will happen in Pittsburgh? That's what we all get to find out together over the next week. How delightful for us all.

NCAA Tournament Team Scoring Based On Seeds

NCAA Tournament Team Scoring Based On Seeds

We run the 2019 NCAA Wrestling Championship seeds through a scoring rubric to see what the team race would look like if chalk prevailed.

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