This headline might confuse you. I get it. It confuses me too. When I went to write up my bracket watch consulting Joe Lunardi and Jerry Palm’s Friday brackets, Palm has Wisconsin as the first four teams out. And on top of that, Palm ranks Wisconsin 69th. That is crazy to me. Lunardi puts Wisconsin at the eight-line. Bracket Matrix hasn’t updated with the 1/31 brackets, but other brackets mid-week had the Badgers averaging 7.97 seed so basically an eight seed. We’ll see what happens with Wisconsin, but I do think that’s an overreaction from Palm.

Wisconsin Badgers
As mentioned, Palm has the Badgers out of the tournament. As for Lunardi, he puts Wisconsin at eight seed. They have moved down two seed lines since last week. Wisconsin would head out to Spokane, Washington and play Texas Tech. That would be one of the more fundamentally sound and for some, boring games of March Madness history. They would likely face Gonzaga in the state of Washington. That might not work out well, but Badgers have thrived as an eight seed before.

Marquette Golden Eagles
Marquette might have made a truly strong move in the brackets had they beat Butler on the road. But sadly, they did not due to a host of reasons. They did beat Xavier on the road. Palm and Lunardi are almost aligned on Marquette. Palm kept the Golden Eagles at the seventh seed while Lunardi kept them at the six-line. Bracket Matrix has the Golden Eagles as the second-best seventh seed, only behind Rutgers. Lukus Harkins of Busting The Brackets said after their Xavier win says ‘Marquette is a practical a tournament lock’.

Marquette takes down Xavier in double overtime despite missing Markus Howard down the stretch of regulation and both overtimes. Sacar Anim led the way with 27 points while Koby McEwen also made some big-time shots.

Golden Eagles are pretty much an NCAAT lock.

— Lukas Harkins (@hardwiredsports) January 30, 2020

As for opponents at this point, Lunardi puts Marquette in St. Louis playing Oklahoma and if they win, they would face Michigan State. Cassius Winston versus Markus Howard, sign me up. Palm sends Marquette to Cleveland to play Memphis which would be a lovely matchup for the Golden Eagles. If they win, they take on Florida State which would be not ideal. The one nice thing about both locations is Marquette playing in the Midwest with a great traveling fanbase.

Charlie.