Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - WIN YOUR BRACKET POOL: What Five Teams Can Win the 2025 NCAA National Championship

Episode Date: March 17, 2025

Which NCAA basketball teams have the best shot at the national championship? Discover the secrets behind the Kansas Jayhawks' potential path to victory, as well as insights into other top contenders like Houston, Auburn, Duke and other teams. Host Derek Johnson breaks down the criteria that have historically predicted champions, including offensive and defensive efficiency, coach experience, and conference performance to come up with the five teams most likely to win your bracket pick and the 2025 NCAA National Championship.With a focus on key players and strategic elements, this analysis offers a comprehensive look at what it takes to win it all. Don't miss out on expert predictions and strategic insights that could make or break your bracket picks. Tune in for a deep dive into the world of college basketball and find out which team might just take the crown.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!NissanTake your adventures to new heights in the All-New Nissan Armada PRO-4X. Learn more at NissanUSA.com.Disclaimers: Optional features. Towing capacity varies by configuration. See Nissan Towing Guide and Owner’s Manual for additional information. Always secure cargo.Supply HouseJoin the Trade Master program today at SupplyHouse.com/TM and start ordering plumbing, HVAC, and electrical supplies with just a few clicks. Plus, use promo code SH5 for 5% off your first order. That’s SupplyHouse.com!WayFairAfter the holiday hustle, there’s nothing like giving your home a little TLC. Give your home the refresh it needs with Wayfair. Head to Wayfair.com right now. Wayfair. Every style. Every home.  FactorLooking to optimize your nutrition this year? Eat smart with Factor. Get started at FACTOR MEALS.com/FACTORPODCAST and use code FACTORPODCAST to get 50% off your first box plus free shipping.Turbo TaxReady for stress-free taxes and the most money back, guaranteed? Head over to TurboTax.com today and get matched with your Expert. Only available with TurboTax Live Full Service. Real-time updates only in the iOS mobile app. See guarantee details at TurboTax.com/guarantees.ROYDownload the Roy app now from the App Store and start backing your favorite athletes the way they deserve—with transparency, trust, and a real impact. This is the future of college sports. Join it now by downloading Roy and supporting your favorite players!Monarch MoneyTake control of your finances with Monarch Money. Use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE at monarchmoney.com for 50% off your first year. FanDuelRight now, new customers can get TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in BONUS BETS when your first FIVE DOLLAR BET WINS! Download the app or head to FANDUEL.COM to get started. Bet with FanDuel—Official Partner of the NBA.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)

Do you want to win your bracket pick? Will you better pick the champion? Which teams can actually win it? I'm going to give you the five teams that can and throw everybody else in the trash can. You are locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, part of the locked on podcast network, your team every day. What's going on?

Derek Johnson here. This is Locked On Jayhawks. Thanks for making it your first listen every day. And I guess your second listen today, this is a bonus episode. Thank you to every dayers catching each and every show and we're free and available wherever you get podcasts, including on our YouTube page. And again, shout out if you already listened to our post tournament selection show from Sunday,

as well as our episode earlier today, where we narrowed down what teams can and can't make it to the Final Four, including why Kansas actually fits the billing of a team that can make it to the Final Four. But on this bonus episode, we're talking Natty, baby. We're talking national championship. Who can make it?

Who can't? Is Kansas part of that group? Are they? Are they not? We'll find out. But before we get into any of that, today's episode is brought to you by fan dual sportsbook. Now, when you look at the national championship, this is something where I can't give you one answer. It's always different

year to year. Three years ago, I think I did this and we ended up with, I want to say three schools that were on the list. And the quick disclaimer here is that it doesn't guarantee the teams are going to go far, but we have had success picking the right team who's going to win, with the exception of two years ago. So three years ago, we had Kansas, Kentucky, and there was a third team in there. I can't remember who it was. Kentucky loses in the first round, Kansas wins the title, right?

So it's not foolproof that you necessarily should pick every team goes far as possible necessarily. But, you know, it worked out here. Twenty twenty three. We had a good run of things, but the problem was we had one stipulation of every coach who had won a national championship, had made an elite eight or further under his belt. And unfortunately, Dan Hurley was not part of that.

So we've since amended it to every or was a first year coach, because Kevin Alley did it. So every coach who's won a national championship has at least had an elite eight under the belt since, I think, 2001 prior to winning the title, unless you're a UConn coach. That's the new rule there. I think last year, this produced for us, UConn Purdue. And there was a third team in there too,

that I cannot remember. But point being, this has been pretty good. And it's again, not a 100% failsafe, but don't you want to bet with the streak? Don't you want to bet what the percentages give you the better chance of winning? If you pick the right team to win the title, there's a good chance you're going to be in contention

to win some money in your bracket pick, or at least be up there for bragging rights and have a good opportunity there. All right, let's get into the national title criteria. This is Locked on Jayhawks. This episode of the show is brought to you by Supply House. Get the supplies you need from the site made for the skilled traders, Supply House. Whether you're into plumbing, HVAC, or electrical work, Supply House is the reliable way to

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All right, who can win the national title? I'm going to narrow this down to five schools for you that you should be picking one of the five or do your own thing because brackets are fun and you don't do crazy stuff, right? OK, so there have been 23 national champions since 2001. Unfortunately, it would be 24, but 2020 got canceled with COVID. So 23 national champions since 2001, every national champion entered the tournament. It's not post tournaments.

That's they entered the NCAA tournament ranked top 57 on offense, according to Ken Palm, top 44 on defense, according to Ken Palm, top 25 overall on Ken Palm. They were at least a seven seed at the worst. Every coach had either been in their first NCAA tournament or made a second round. And every single one had made it to their conference tournament semifinals at the very least. That's one way of looking at it here.

Now, if you want, you can narrow this down a little bit more. 22 of the last 23 national champions, top 21 on offense. 22 of the last 23, top 37 on defense. 20 of the 23 were top six overall on Ken Pong. 22 of the 23 were top four seats. Every non-Yukon coach had at least an elite eight under his belt, as we just mentioned. And 14 of the 23 made their conference finals. That one I'm

a little less enthused or tied to. And furthermore, if you want to just look at recent data, the last seven national champions were top six in offense, entering into the NCAA tournament. And the last seven also had better offenses than they did defense. With the way the game is played now, it's more important to have offensive talent than it is defensive talent, even though defense still important to be at least decent. The offense is even more important there. The last nine champions were top six headed in to the NCAA tournament in overall ranking as well. And eight of the last nine champions were either one

or two seeds. The one exception, you had, I guess, no, the further exception back would have been the seven seed UConn team. I'm trying to think who is the three seed or something who wants it. Anyway, it'll come to me at some point, but that'll give us some good data to go off here. So who's left? OK, so if we just narrowed down already to just top 25 teams on Ken Palm, who are top seven seeds, that leads us with Duke, Florida, Houston, Auburn, Tennessee, Bama, Texas Tech, Michigan State, Iowa State,

St. John's, Maryland, Wisconsin, Arizona, Missouri, Kentucky, Texas, and Clemson Purdue, Illinois, Kansas, St. Mary's, BYU, Michigan. Congrats, you made the first cut. Okay, the next board of this, you have to be top 57 on offense entering the tournament. St. John's is not, so that eliminates them. Onto the next category, you have to be top 44 in adjusted defensive efficiency on Ken Palm entering the tournament. This gets rid of a little bit more teams that are available there.

Missouri, Kentucky. Kentucky is a big one because that's a three seed, right? Purdue, a four seed who was just the runner up last year. BYU, who's a very hot team right now and kind of a trendy pick for people. Those four teams all gone. In addition to St. John's, that's five teams. The next big one is every team who has won a title since 2001 has made it past the conference tournament quarterfinals. They made it to the conference tournament semifinals or better.

That eliminates Iowa State. They got beat by BYU in the quarterfinal round in a close game. Illinois is gone. They lost in the quarters. Kansas lost in the quarterfinals to Arizona. So unfortunately, Kansas will not be making the cut here. And then Texas A&M lost to Texas in the SEC tournament game before the semi. So that eliminates some more teams. Then you have the stat of every non Connecticut coach had at least an elite

eight under their belt. So some tournament experience that one eliminates Florida, Todd Golden, only two tournament appearances lost in the first round both years last year. Maybe the game in the first round with years last year, maybe the game in the first round with how high scoring that was against Colorado. He had an awesome game the year. He was at San Francisco. I forget that maybe Murray State was the seven. That was a good game too. But yeah, that would eliminate him. Graham

McCasland did have a tournament win at North Texas, but he hasn't made an elite eight. Texas Tech gone. Maryland and their head coach was previously at Seton Hall. He never made it to the second weekend. So they're gone. Wisconsin's Greg guard. I could sworn he had a lead under his belt. But I guess I was mushing him together with their previous coach and the furthest Greg guard has gone is the sweet 16. So Wisconsin gone. Arizona with Tommy Lloyd, he's made I think two sweet 16s. Not only late though, so he's gone. And then

St. Mary's with Randy Bennett. They made the one sweet 16 with Omar Samhain and I forget if Patty Mills was on that team at that point. But yeah, St. Mary's getting eliminated here because they don't have an elite eight. So now you're left with not a ton of teams. Who are those teams that are left? I'll tell you about it right after this quick timeout.

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ship here, so to speak, right? So I mentioned some of those ones that you can point to and say, okay, instead of saying every team was top 57 in offense, 22 of the 23 champions were top 21. That gives you a much smaller base. And yes, you could say, okay, well that leaves out an exception to the rule. I mean, if you're gonna say that you're gonna hit

on a lot of your NCAA tournament winners year in and year out, but you're gonna say that you're gonna hit on a lot of your NCAA tournament winners, year in and year out, but you're gonna miss out on the one year that a seven seed UConn wins the national title, I think you gotta just kind of accept that, right? You can't be perfect at this thing. So try to just play the odds. So anyway, 22 of the 23 champs, top 21 in offense.

22 of the 23 champs, top 37 in defense. Again, these are entering the tournament. 22 of the 23 top four seed in their region and either a Yukon coach or a lead eight or better from the head coach. Again, the conference semis or better. That only leaves us with five teams. These are the five teams that I think you should pick

one of these five. Pick your favorite of the five, whether it's favorite path, favorite whatever, right? And you know, there's a good chance, right, that the with the NCAA tournament, it is chaotic, like maybe this the year where there's the exception to the rule. Sure. That would leave Alabama, that would leave Tennessee, that would leave Auburn, that would leave Houston, and that would leave Duke. And you could say if you wanted to go by, you know, the teams that fit into the billing of we mentioned, eight of the last nine were one or two seeds. Okay, well, Alabama is a two

seed, Tennessee is a two seed, Auburn's a one seed, Houston's one seed, Duke's a one seed, they would all fit into that too. Then if you also talked about that the last nine were top six in just overall ranking, entering the tournament, well, guess what, all of them qualify for that too. So I think this is a very strong group to go with this year. If you gave me that option, is the champion gonna come from one of those five,

Alabama, Tennessee, Auburn, Houston, or Duke? Will one of those teams win the national championship or will it be the field? I would obviously take that. Now, I do feel weird because in past years, we've maybe only been able to drop this thing down to like three teams. That makes it easier to pick from than maybe five.

I think there is one stat that like no team has won the national championship shooting below 35% from three. The problem with that is Duke is shooting like 38% almost, Houston shooting like 40% from three, Auburn is at 37% from three, Tennessee is where you run into the issue, 34% from three. And then Alabama is shooting right

on the number of 35, but if they win the title, they'll probably end up shooting better than that. That's the thing though, Tennessee at 34%, if they win six games to win the title, probably see that three point percentage climb up. But if you wanna not pick Tennessee from that group because of that, and maybe because of Rick Barnes past tournaments, that's totally fine.

And you could just say, okay, Bama, Auburn, Houston Duke, pick one of those four. So there you go. Hopefully it is one of those four. Well, hopefully it's Kansas, but you know, if not, hopefully that helps you out with your bracket pick. And if I'm wrong, hold it against me or don't.

I don't really care. It's your bracket, have fun with it, do whatever, right? It's usually the person who doesn't, it just like picks the colors or whatever who wins this thing. So it is an exact science, but it is fun to at least go through this and hope you learned something from it. All right, that'll do it for this episode of Locked on Jay

Ox. You can find our shows anywhere you get your podcast, including on our YouTube page. See you next time with LOJ.