March Madness 2019: 10 most likely first-round upsets in the NCAA Tournament

East Region

(9) UCF Knights over (8) VCU Rams
A nine-seed beating an eight-seed is very rarely considered to be an upset but, for seed purposes, I’m including it on this list.

Both of these teams are tremendous on the defensive end but are lacking offensively. VCU figures to be lacking a little more, however, as leading scorer Marcus Evans suffered a knee injury in the A-10 Tournament. He’s expected to play in this game but he almost certainly won’t be at 100 percent.

Though the Knights enter this game on a two-game losing streak, they had beaten two tournament teams in Cincinnati and Houston two weeks ago, both of whom also have great defenses. This will be close but I give UCF the slight edge given Evans’ injury.

(11) Belmont Bruins over (6) Maryland Terrapins
This is a great upset pick for me. I know it’s technically Belmont/Temple over Maryland, but it’s my firm belief that you should pick every game in your bracket and I’m picking Belmont to beat Temple (though if Temple won I’d pick them to win this game, too).

Belmont has one of the nation’s most efficient offenses because of their shooting, execution, and low turnover percentage. Essentially, they don’t beat themselves and usually get what they want.

Maryland, on the other hand, is trending in the wrong direction. They have lost three of their last four games, turn the ball over a lot (262nd nationally), and aren’t a great three-point shooting team. The Terps are also a young team and have a head coach in Mark Turgeon who traditionally underachieves in tournament settings.

Go with the Bruins.