John Blanchette: With the bracket busted, who has the best shot at tripping up Gonzaga before the NCAA finish line?

INDIANAPOLIS – So the NCAA’s selection committee got it right, after all.

Kidding! Those bozos didn’t have a clue.

If you wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt, you could say there was a method to their March Madness. But the NCAA hasn’t earned a pass on anything these days, so keep those darts airborne.

Sure, they labor under a no-win proposition. When the top seeds hold through the first weekend, it’s a boring tournament. When the B-list guests start tipping over furniture and spilling guacamole on the carpet, then it’s a party.

When the committee is right, it’s wrong. And when it’s wrong, it’s oh-so right.

Still, that doesn’t explain away the business of making Iowa, Kansas and Virginia the 2-3-4 seeds behind Gonzaga in the West Region – teams the Bulldogs had battered and beaten already during the regular season.

The good news? They’re all gone.

The supposed biggest threats to the Zags in the tournament’s first two weeks all went down – hard. Chalk that up to bad staff work in the seeding room if you’d like, but the losers seemed awfully resigned to becoming victims of the chaos, too.

And with the field now pared to 16 teams, it’s time to ask:

Who can stop Gonzaga?

The given is Baylor, which took an unbeaten record into a February COVID-19 pause before finally stumbling. But the Bears can’t see the Zags until the championship game – and it’s very much the game America wants to see.

The other easy answer, of course, is the next team – which for GU happens to be Creighton on Sunday. The game ahead is always the most dangerous one because it’s not a best-of-seven with the wiggle room to put a C-plus effort behind you.

“All it takes is for a team to put together a great game,” an anonymous college coach who was polled for his scouting report said.

But some teams are obviously better equipped than others.

Not that they’re easy to sniff out. Just a month ago, none other than Sports Illustrated – which put Gonzaga on its cover to orgasmic overreaction in Spokane – picked 14 teams most likely to derail a Gonzaga-Baylor title game.

Ten are out of the tournament.

Pac-12 compadres Oregon and USC, which did the fileting of Iowa and Kansas in the second round and will play for a spot in the regional final, were not on the list. The Ducks have a wave of long, athletic wing players. The Trojans have Evan Mobley – graceful and powerful at both ends of the floor – and older brother Isaiah.

Coach isn’t sold.

“Dana Altman’s as good of a coach as there is in the country,” he said, “but Oregon doesn’t have the size. They’re playing with a 6-foot-5 ‘4’ man a lot. USC has the length – those brothers are terrific – but I just don’t think they shoot it well enough.”

Instead, he has a couple of others he sees as more likely.

“One is Alabama,” the coach said. “You have to be able to score to beat Gonzaga, because they’re going to score. I don’t see how anybody keeps them in a 72-73 point game. In my mind, that eliminates a team like Houston. They’re relentless, but they just don’t score it well enough. Alabama can score. They really shoot the ball at the 3-point line and they play with pace.”

Alabama is a No. 2 that will likely have to get past a No. 1 in Michigan, but the Wolverines are still without forward Isaiah Livers “indefinitely” after he suffered a foot fracture at the Big Ten Tournament.

The other No. 1 remaining is Baylor – which stands in the way of our scout’s other team with the best chance of beating GU.

“Arkansas,” he said. “The coach, Eric Musselman, is a strange dude, but in a one-shot opportunity, they can beat Gonzaga. They have length and athletic ability. They can score and have the ability to play fast.

“The adage is it takes two to tango, and that to play fast it takes two teams. I don’t know if it’s true, but I haven’t seen anybody get Gonzaga into a grind-it-out affair.”

So what’s the Musselman factor?

“He’s got the pro background – both his own and his father’s – and he has the ability to exploit matchups. One Achilles’ heel for Gonzaga that wouldn’t get exposed in the West Coast Conference is Drew Timme in foul trouble early in the game. Then a team with good enough players and a coach with a style of hunting matchups can find an advantage. Very few college coaches do, but he does.”

So … Baylor, ’Bama and Arkansas?

“But I’ve still got Gonzaga,” he said.

He has a caveat, too.

“The team I would have picked at the top of the list with the best chance to beat them,” he said, “got beat in the second round.”

Illinois, he means – just another right choice that went wrong.