Joe Lunardi, heralded college basketball analyst, updated his projected 2026-27 NCAA Tournament bracket this morning. Virginia was given a No. 3 seed, which would repeat its prefix from last season.
Coach Ryan Odom’s Cavaliers were moved up one seed from the previous projections released in June. The entire field has shifted slightly, which affects Virginia’s potential NCAA Tournament path as well as other ACC teams.
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A formidable path forward
The Cavaliers are projected as a three seed in the South Region in San Antonio, Texas. Other notable teams in that quadrant include Illinois (projected No. 1 seed in the region), Texas (No. 2), Kansas (No. 4) and Tennessee (No. 5).
In this potential bracket, Virginia would battle a mix of storied programs – and ones with connections to the Cavaliers. The obvious main connection is to the Volunteers, the team that booted Virginia in the Round of 32 last season. There are a few more distant ties as well.
In the first round of action, Lunardi projects the Cavaliers to play in Omaha, Neb. and face No. 14 seed St. Thomas (Minn.), the school Andrew Rohde came from when he transferred to Virginia.
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Should the Cavaliers win that contest, they would face No. 6 seed BYU, or No. 11 seed Oregon/Xavier. While Virginia seldom faces the Cougars or Musketeers, it played the Ducks in the Sweet 16 back in the 2018-19 National Championship run.
If the Cavaliers escape Omaha, though, Lunardi predicts an arduous task at hand. The highest seed Virginia could face would be Texas – a team which would play all of its games less than three hours away until the Final Four.
In particular, the Cavaliers would face Longhorns just over an hour away from their campus.
Where is the rest of the ACC?
At the moment, seven ACC teams are projected to earn a spot in the NCAA Tournament field. None of them are in the same regional bracket as Virginia. Here is where they came in:
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East Regional (New York): No. 2 Louisville, No. 8 Miami
West Regional (Los Angeles): No. 10 NC State
Midwest Regional (Kansas City): No. 1 Duke, No. 7 North Carolina, No. 12 Clemson
Note that Clemson is slotted as one of the last four teams to make the bracket. Virginia Tech is ranked among the “next four out” cohort, for teams ranked 81 to 84.
Of course, there will not be any regular season basketball games for several months. But for the time being, analysts have predicted that the Cavaliers are primed to receive one of the top 12 seeds in the NCAA Tournament.
Virginia, meanwhile, has its sights aimed higher.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com/college/virginia as Too Low or Too High: Breaking Down the Latest Way-Too-Early Bracketology Projections for UVA Basketball.
