With the first week of the 2024-25 college basketball season in the books, ESPN’s Joe Lunardi released a bracketology update that features nine teams from the Big 12 Conference earning an invite to the 2025 NCAA Tournament.
The nine teams listed as tournament participants are (1) Kansas, (2) Arizona, (2) Iowa State, (3) Houston, (3) Baylor, (4) Cincinnati, (5) Texas Tech, (9) Kansas State, and (10) BYU.
Bill Self and the Kansas Jayhawks earned the top overall seed in Lunardi’s bracket after constructing one of the best off-season portal hauls in college basketball history. All-American center Hunter Dickinson headlines the group, with veteran point guard Dajuan Harris, reliable forward KJ Adams, and a cast of multiple impressive transfers.
While the Big 12 has unquestionably earned the right to dub itself the nation’s premier college basketball conference, in Lunardi’s update, the SEC and Big Ten placed more teams in the tournament than the Big 12, with 10 SEC teams and 11 Big Ten teams earning bids.
In the scenario listed above, the matchups based on seeding would look like this.
(1) Kansas vs. (16) Colgate
(2) Arizona vs. (15) Montana
(2) Iowa State vs. (15) South Dakota State
(3) Baylor vs. (14) Ohio
(3) Houston vs. (14) Arkansas State
(4) Cincinnati vs. (13) High Point
(5) Texas Tech vs. (12) Princeton
(9) Kansas State vs. (8) Xavier
(10) BYU vs. (7) Wake Forrest
While the 2025 NCAA Tournament is still more than four months away, the nine teams listed above from the Big 12 Conference are currently passing the eye test as tournament bids, at least in the eyes of Joe Lunardi.
