Will Tennessee basketball defeat Iowa State and advance to a third-straight Elite Eight? Will the Vols parlay that into another win to earn a spot in the program’s first-ever Final Four? Could UT raise a banner and win the national title?
The volatility of March Madness makes it impossible to say for sure, but analytics can give us insight into how likely those results are. On EvanMiya.com, he uses analytics to offer the probability in percentages that each team will advance at this point in the NCAA Tournament.
As far as Tennessee, he lists the six-seeded Vols with 29.3% chance to beat two-seed Iowa State and make it to the Elite Eight. This is the 12th-best mark to make the next round of the 16 teams remaining. Michigan holds the top mark with a 94.8% chance to beat Alabama.
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The winners between UT and ISU and the Wolverines and Crimson Tide will match up for a spot in the Final Four. EvanMiya has Tennessee listed with a 4.8% propability to make program history and win two games in Chicago this weekend. That’s just the 14th-best mark of the 16 teams remaining.
The low numbers for the Vols to make the Final Four and for Alabama to survive may say more about how high the analytics are on Michigan than it does the assessment of Tennessee and the Tide, though. The Wolverines are just a tick behind Duke for the top spot in the nation in EvanMiya’s rankings.
What if Tennessee does stay alive into the Final Four, though? EvanMiya has the Vols with a 1.3% chance to make the title game at this point in the bracket. That’s the 12th-best mark among the 16 remaining teams. To win the national title, the site has UT at 0.4%, the 14th-best mark.
