NCAA Tournament Bracket 2010: DOWNLOAD HERE

The 2010 NCAA Tournament bracket has been released. Click HERE to download the bracket (PDF file). (Scroll down to see an embedded version, as well as a text copy.) The 1-seeds are Kansas, Kentucky, Duke and Syracuse. Kansas is the overall #1 seed.

The opening round game is on Tuesday, March 16, between Arkansas-Pine Bluff and Winthrop. Round one kicks off on Thursday and runs from March 18-19. The second round takes place on March 20 and 21. The Sweet 16 round starts on March 25 and concludes on the 26th. The Elite Eight round occurs on March 27 and 28. On April 3, the Final Four is narrowed to just two teams, and the NCAA champions will be crowned on April 5 in Indianapolis.

Scroll down to see how each team is seeded and to download and view the full bracket.

MIDWEST

1 Kansas
2 Ohio State
3 Georgetown
4 Maryland
5 Michigan State
6 Tennessee
7 Oklahoma State
8 UNLV
9 Northern Iowa
10 Georgia Tech
11 San Diego State
12 New Mexico State
13 Houston
14 Ohio
15 UC Santa Barbara
16 Lehigh

EAST

1 Kentucky
2 West Virginia
3 New Mexico
4 Wisconsin
5 Temple
6 Marquette
7 Clemson
8 Texas
9 Wake Forest
10 Missouri
11 Washington
12 Cornell
13 Wofford
14 Montana
15 Morgan State
16 East Tennessee

WEST

1 Syracuse
2 Kansas State
3 Pittsburgh
4 Vanderbilt
5 Butler
6 Xavier
7 BYU
8 Gonzaga
9 Florida State
10 Florida
11 Minnesota
12 UTEP
13 Murray State
14 Oakland
15 North Texas
16 Vermont

SOUTH

1 Duke
2 Villanova
3 Baylor
4 Purdue
5 Texas A&M
6 Notre Dame
7 Richmond
8 California
9 Louisville
10 Saint Mary's
11 Old Dominion
12 Utah State
13 Siena
14 Sam Houston State
15 Robert Morris
16 Arkansas-Pine Bluff OR Winthrop

Click HERE to download bracket.

Comments

[DavidWyld]

01:51 PM on 03/15/2010

Ah, let the bracket-fi­lling-out and wagering begin - don't try to get folks to do much on Thursday or Friday!

David

[Fabini]

05:25 PM on 03/15/2010

. . . or Saturday or Sunday.

[WIpatriot]

12:28 AM on 03/17/2010

I reserve this weekend every year...my vacation as a couch potato.

[enlightened45]

01:21 PM on 03/15/2010

What kind of dirt does Duke have on the selection committee.­...video of or...gies during the selection weekend...­..or what? The chairman never could answer the questions about it when they were put to him...just some nonsense that just used up time.....

[ladylove114]

11:07 AM on 03/15/2010

Duke vs. Arkansas-P­ine Bluff should really be a "barn burner".

[Dubois651]

10:55 AM on 03/15/2010

Georgetown Hoyas will be the 2010 NCAA Champions. Biggest upset of the tourney will be Cornell University eliminatin­g Kentucky. West Virginia will end up in the Final Four, as they are a sleeper, with experience­d coaching and athleticis­m. Another team that will likely make a surprise run is Richmond. March Madness is always good times.

[WIpatriot]

12:33 AM on 03/17/2010

Prophetic! Seriously.

[WIpatriot]

11:29 PM on 03/18/2010

Or maybe not so much...lol­. Still good times!

[DJlaysitup]

10:51 AM on 03/15/2010

As Stringer mentioned below: Obvious preferenti­al treatment for Duke as usual. They get a questionab­le #1 seed, then they get Villanova as the #2 seed in their bracket (easily weakest 2 seed), then to top it off they get Purdue as the #4 seed in their section of the Southern Regional..­(injuries/­playing poorly). Coach K must have a lot of pictures.

[Fabini]

09:54 AM on 03/15/2010

It's Wofford vs Vermont !!

[LIBERTARIANS SHOULD RULE]

08:39 AM on 03/15/2010

I have a real problem with the way the Tourney selects teams. If they have no intentions of expanding, then a real effort should be made to field the BEST 65 teams.

The single biggest thing that needs to happen is that certain small conference­s should not recieve an automatic bid just for winning their Legue title. Wofford, Oakland are just a few examples. Neither of these schools would win 3 games in a major league such as the ACC or Big East for example. The reason that a #16 seed has never defeated a #1 seed is becasue the Tourney is not set up to put the best 65 in the tourney. If a team like Virginia Tech, who had 20+ win season and a winning record in the ACC was the 16th seed rather than a team like "Vermont", you may just see #1 teams get knocked off in the first round.

The BCS in football does not offer automic BCS bowl bids like C-USA, WAC, Mtn West as a few examples because they simply do not meet the criteria to be considered an top level BCS school. The BCS does offer "AT-LARGE" bids, but being a conference champ in a non-signic­ant league doesn't not offer a shot in the BCS, you have to be a Top team.

These small leagues that take up tourney space should have to play against teams in the traditiona­l best leagues to prove their worth.

[plooger]

09:32 AM on 03/15/2010

Yes, and the automatic bids for these "low power" conference­s become more problemati­c those years when they happen to have a likely "at large" team in the conference but that team fails to win the conference tournament­, doubling the bids consumed by the conference­. This year there are at least 3 examples of "outside the bubble" teams that won their conference regular seasons but failed to win their tournament­, yet were given bids largely because they'd won their conference regular season.

As an example, from the Big Ten, if you remove the 4 Top 16 teams from the league, Illinois wins the "Big 7" regular season outright. If this "Big 7" were one of the mid-major conference­s this year, Illinois would have received an invite.

The simplest solution to mitigate some of these bid hiccups would be to minimally expand the Tuesday Opening Round to either 4, 6 or 8 games. This would also improve the quality of teams assuming the #16/15 seeds come the first round. As things stand now, the first round is mostly pointless for the #1/#2 seeds.

[ladylove114]

09:57 AM on 03/15/2010

There is a problem with it. And yes, I am biased, but Mississipp­i State beat Vandy and Florida in the SEC tourney. Kentucky won by 1 in the finals in OT. During regular season game with Kentucky it went to OT. When the Kentucly fans are on the message boards screaming because Miss. State didn't get in should tell the committee something. Kentucky's coach said yesterday "If we are number 2 in the country, what are they?" Then, snubbed by the committee. There are teams in the Big Dance Miss.State would mop the floor with. Yeah, we lost a couple of games early in the season we should not have lost, but good grief. OK, I have vented.

[rodneyhopper]

10:38 AM on 03/15/2010

That's funny. I was going to get on here and say the same thing.

I'm biased as well, but Mississipp­i State deserved it over Florida.

The argument was that State didn't have a lot of quality wins and had some bad losses. The bad losses part I tend to agree with, but they beat Florida and Vandy back to back, not to mention their earlier win over Old Dominion, another tournament team.

And they came within an eyelash -twice- of beating the number 2 team in the country, taking them to overtime in both meetings.

And they did all of this with the NCAA using its heavy hand to punish their star recruit, keeping him out for the entire season.

Not to mention, their center set the NCAA record for blocked shots.

State deserved better, but it's just another example of the way the NCAA treats the Haves and the Have-nots.

Florida's the bigger market, so they get the nod.

[El Gatador]

12:08 PM on 03/15/2010

I'm not biased as I have no allegiance to Miss St or the SEC in general. However, I do watch an unhealthy amount of college bball. Miss St. is better than Florida. In my mind, that is not up for debate.

[apessano]

07:35 AM on 03/15/2010

Aha! Glad to see that UCSB made it to he tournament­. Too bad the joy won't last long :(
Go Gauchos!

[HarukoHaruhara]

02:10 AM on 03/15/2010

Go Griz!

We want the Lobos!

[Cogs]

12:51 AM on 03/15/2010

Northweste­rn goes to the NIT. Wait'll next year!

[avvocato]

10:54 AM on 03/15/2010

TWO (2) losses to PSU on its resume.

[stringer]

12:37 AM on 03/15/2010

As usual Duke gets ridiculous­ly preferenti­al treatment. The third 1-seed. They deserved to be a 2. Kentucky and Kansas, the top 2 one seeds, actually got stuck with the toughest road.

Whatever Duke has on the committee it must be a doozy.

[bobbiisadukefan]

09:27 AM on 03/15/2010

It's called "got game"

[rodneyhopper]

11:25 AM on 03/15/2010

It's called protection­ism.

The NCAA has a long history of protecting their premiere teams, the ratings grabbers.

Duke didn't even win their conference cleanly.

3 of Kansas State's losses were to Kansas and they were the number 1 team.

They did the same thing for Duke back in 2004.
Mississipp­i State was 25-3 in the regular season.
Duke was 27-5.

State's only losses were to tournament teams Kentucky (no.1), Alabama (who ended up going to the elite eight that year), and Vanderbilt­.

Duke had an embarrassi­ng loss to Purdue (a non NCAA team), along with losses to NC State, Wake Forest, Georgia Tech, and Maryland.

Not to mention that Mississipp­i State's losses were by a combined 9 points, less than Duke's Purdue loss alone.

So who got the 1 seed?

Of course, the NCAA's darling program, Duke.

Now, I'm biased because I'm admittedly a Mississipp­i State fan, but I know there are plenty of others out there that have seen their program get screwed over because it came down to their team and Duke.

"Protect the Premiere" is the NCAA's motto.

[rodneyhopper]

11:28 AM on 03/15/2010

Obviously, by non-NCAA team, I mean Purdue didn't go to the NCAA tournament that year.

[Forester]

12:19 AM on 03/15/2010

So Cal would have to face Duke if they can get past Louisville­?

ok, maybe.

Go Bears!

[lesterbud]

09:38 AM on 03/15/2010

Cal is lucky for that.
I am an Old Blue and my ties to Cal continue to this day, but have you watched these guys play? Teams with size - big problem for them.
Teams with speed - big problem for them.
If they don't hit their three's - they lose.
I don't need to elaborate on the downfall of the Pac-10, except that Cal would have been 5 games under .500 in the Big East or ACC.
I just don't see any heart in the team, other than a couple of players.
Coach couldn't even get the refs to review the shot Washington made ofter the clock expired - no heart.
I think the Cardinals send them packing.

[The Bank]

12:09 AM on 03/15/2010

Duke FTW.

[TOPCAT711]

12:02 AM on 03/15/2010

Let's all join Jim Bunning in cheering for Kentucky.

[booboo111]

01:56 AM on 03/15/2010

Hang on topcat, Ashley Judd went to Kentucky.

[lesterbud]

09:38 AM on 03/15/2010

2 guard??

[enlightened45]

01:01 PM on 03/15/2010

Equating Bunning with a college basketball team is just stoo..pid on the face of it.....and shows you need to stop being so jealous of success...­.of the Cats, not Bunning...­..........­..

[BillGresho]

11:57 PM on 03/14/2010

Mountain Hawks vs. Jay Hawks! Amazing!. Simply amazing. Shine on Lehigh. Old South Mountain will be abuzz on Thursday regardless of the outcome!