Web Update: Men's basketball earns No. 13 seed, will play Kentucky

When the brackets were revealed during the NCAA Tournament Selection Show on Sunday, the men’s basketball team was one of 68 to learn its postseason fate. The Tigers earned a No. 13 seed and will play No. 4-seed Kentucky in its first game, which will take place on Thursday in Tampa, Fla., at 2:45 p.m.

If it pulls off an upset in its opening game, Princeton will play No. 5-seed West Virgnia, No. 12-seed University of Alabama at Birmingham or No. 12-seed Clemson University in the next round on Saturday at the same location.

The Tigers are making their first NCAA Tournament appearance since 2004, when the No. 14-seed lost to No. 3-seeded Texas in the first round 66-49. Princeton’s last tournament victory came in 1998, when the nationally-ranked squad defeated No. 12-seed UNLV in the opener before losing to No. 4-seed Michigan State in the second round, 63-56.

Princeton earned a trip to the Big Dance with a 63-62 victory over Harvard on Saturday at Yale, a neutral-site playoff between the two conference co-champions to determine who would receive the league’s automatic bid. The Tigers overcame a 10-point second-half deficit to force a wild closing minute that featured three lead changes, the last of which came on junior guard Doug Davis’s buzzer-beating, game-winning jumper.

Some speculated that Harvard might earn an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament, but the Crimson was not invited and will likely play in the National Invitation Tournament. The Ivy League has never sent two teams to the NCAA Tournament in one year.

Last year’s representative of the Ancient Eight, Cornell, defeated Temple and Wisconsin in the first two rounds to advance to the Sweet 16, the farthest run for an Ivy League team since Penn reached the national semifinals in 1979.

Princeton finished 12-2 in the Ivy League and 25-6 overall, including a perfect 12-0 record at Jadwin Gymnasium. Senior forward Kareem Maddox, sophomore forward Ian Hummer, senior guard Dan Mavraides and Davis each averaged double figures for the season. Maddox was named the Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year and a first-team all-star, while Hummer and Mavraides earned second-team All-Ivy.

Two of the Tigers’ regular-season opponents also earned bids to the NCAA Tournament: No. 1-seed Duke, which beat Princeton 97-60 at Cameron Indoor Stadium in November, and Patriot League champion and No. 14-seed Bucknell, which the Tigers defeated 66-55 on a neutral court.

Kentucky (25-8 overall, 10-6 SEC East) reached the Elite Eight last season but lost most of its top players to the NBA Draft. The new-look Wildcats have a strong defense and even more potent offense, led by freshmen Brandon Knight and Terrence Jones, who combined for 34 points per game. Kentucky won the SEC Tournament with a 70-54 victory over Florida earlier Sunday.

The Wildcats could knock Ivy League teams out of the tournament in two consecutive years, as they ended Cornell's tournament run last season.

All NCAA Tournament games will be televised live in their entirety on one of four networks: CBS, TNT, TBS or truTV. Every game will also be streamed for free online.