Where will Kentucky be seeded in the NCAA Tournament? A last look at bracketology updates.
Selection Sunday is finally here, and the 2023 NCAA Tournament bracket will be fully revealed during the annual selection show at 6 p.m. on CBS.
Where will the Kentucky Wildcats be seeded? And where will UK be playing basketball later this week (and possibly beyond)?
Several major bracketology websites updated their NCAA Tournament boards Sunday morning, and there’s a split in predictions, with some projecting the Cats will be a 7 seed when their name is called later in the day and others slotting UK onto the 6 seed line.
ESPN’s Joe Lunardi projects Kentucky as a 7 seed, playing a first-round game against Boise State in Sacramento, with 2-seeded UCLA as a possible second-round matchup. (UCLA beat Kentucky 63-53 in December.) ESPN’s board has UK playing in the Las Vegas Regional.
The CBS Sports bracketology board also has the Wildcats as a 7 seed and playing Boise State in Sacramento to begin the tournament, with 2-seeded Gonzaga as a possible second-round opponent. (Gonzaga beat UK 88-72 in November.) CBS also has UK in the Las Vegas Regional.
The final bracketology from USA Today, posted Sunday morning, also puts Kentucky as a 7 seed, playing Boise State in the first round in Denver, with 2-seeded Texas looming next. That bracket puts UK in the Kansas City Regional.
The Athletic’s final bracket update Sunday slots Kentucky as a 6 seed — playing the winner of a North Carolina State-Utah State “First Four” game — in Des Moines, with 3-seeded Baylor as the next possible matchup in the New York City Regional.
Bracketville’s final projection Sunday afternoon placed UK as a 6 seed in Albany playing the winner of an Arizona State-Pittsburgh “First Four” game in the first round, with 3-seeded UConn as the possible second-round matchup. That bracket has Kentucky in the New York Regional. The Bracketville seed list ranked UK at No. 24 overall, the last of the four 6 seeds.
BracketWAG.com also places UK as a 6 seed — the No. 23 overall team on the NCAA seed list — playing the winner of a “First Four” game between Rutgers and Pittsburgh, and then possibly facing 3-seeded Marquette in the second round. Those projections have Kentucky starting the tournament in Greensboro, N.C. and slotted into the Louisville Regional.
The varied geographical predictions for Kentucky show just how difficult it is to figure out exactly where the Cats will be playing between now and the time the real brackets are revealed. The eight possible first-round sites are Albany, Birmingham, Columbus, Denver, Des Moines, Greensboro, Orlando and Sacramento.
UK (21-11, 12-6 SEC) went into the week ranked No. 23 in the AP Top 25 poll but lost to Vanderbilt on Friday night in the SEC Tournament quarterfinals.
This story was originally published March 12, 2023 at 9:29 AM.
