Entering the final week of the regular season, ESPN’s Joe Lunardi released an updated Bracketology on Tuesday and it includes what would appear to be a favorable draw for the Kentucky Wildcats.
The new 2024 NCAA Tournament projection has the Wildcats as a No. 4 seed in the Midwest Region (Detroit), opening postseason play in Brooklyn against No. 13 seed Appalachian State alongside (5) Clemson and (12) Richmond.
The Midwest Region also includes No. 1 overall seed Purdue, No. 2 seed Marquette and No. 3 seed Baylor. The top-seeded Boilermakers fell to No. 16 seed Fairleigh Dickinson last season, to No. 15 seed Saint Peter’s the year prior and to No. 13 seed North Texas in 2021.
Lunardi’s No. 1 seeds in the 2024 NCAA Tournament also include Houston (South), Arizona (West), and UConn (East). Kentucky is one of seven SEC teams projected to make the NCAA Tournament, the second-most of any league behind only the Big 12 with nine, where they’ll be joined by (2) Tennessee, (4) Alabama, (5) Auburn, (6) Florida, (6) South Carolina, and (9) Mississippi State.
Kentucky ranks third nationally in scoring, averaging 89.6 points per game, topping 100 points six times this season, the most since the Wildcats’ national championship season of 1995-96. UK has topped the century mark in two of its last three games, including scoring 117 in a win over No. 13 Alabama, the most-ever by any Kentucky team vs. an SEC opponent under head coach John Calipari.
Five Wildcats have scored at least 28 points in a game and eight have scored at least 13 in a game this season.
All-American candidate and fifth-year senior Antonio Reeves leads Kentucky in scoring at 20 points per game and could become just the second UK player in the Calipari era to average 20 points per game for an entire season, joining Jamal Murray in 2015-16. Reeves is also the first Wildcat since Murray with five consecutive 20-point scoring games.
