Despite being ranked No. 1 in both human polls and the RPI this week, Ohio State did not receive the overall No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament last night. After beating Wisconsin yesterday, 66-49, to win the Big Ten tournament, Thad Matta and the players hoped the regular season and tournament championships, combined with their current 17-game winning streak and 30-3 overall record would be enough to get the tournament's overall top seed and theoretically the easiest path to the Final Four.

Instead, they are No. 1 in the South, where a juicy second-round matchup with Xavier awaits, along with a possible regular season rematch with Tennessee in the Sweet 16 in San Antonio, Texas. Ohio State beat the Volunteers in January, 68-66, on a last-second shot by Ron Lewis at Value City Arena.

Memphis, the No. 2 seed in the South, and Texas A&M, the No. 3 seed, are possible Elite Eight opponents.

Ohio State opens against Central Connecticut State (22-11), which won the Northeast Conference tournament to qualify. No top seed has ever lost to a No. 16 seed in the history of the NCAA tournament.

Matta wasn't concerned yesterday with being ranked third among the top seeds. He was just happy to have one.

''We were a two seed last year, now a one seed this year,'' Matta said. ''I think that hopefully says a lot about our program and where it's come in three years.''

Florida (29-5), the defending national champions, received the top No. 1 seed and will play in the Midwest Regional. North Carolina received the second of the No. 1 seeds and will play in the East. Kansas is the fourth No. 1 seed and will play in the West.

Both Florida and North Carolina, the two No. 1 seeds ranked ahead of Ohio State, beat the Buckeyes during the regular season.

The Gators lost consecutive games at LSU and Tennessee during the last week of the regular season, but they blew through the SEC tournament unchallenged over the weekend, including yesterday's 77-56 victory over Arkansas in the SEC title game.

The Gators pounded the Buckeyes in December, 86-60.

''We know that (Florida is) an outstanding team and in the eyes of the committee, they deserved to be on the 1 line,'' NCAA tournament committee chairman Gary Walters said last night in a conference call. ''They're the defending national champs, they're a senior team, they did stub their toe a little bit, but they came on strong in the tournament and by virtue of also having beaten Ohio State the way they did, we just felt they deserved to be where they are.''

Ohio State's possible second-round matchup with Xavier, if the ninth-seeded Musketeers can beat eight-seeded BYU in the opening round, will pit Matta against the school he left in a stormy breakup to come to Columbus.

''Thad kind of looked at us and smirked,'' said freshman Mike Conley Jr., referring to when it was revealed the Buckeyes and Musketeers could meet in the second round. ''That's his school. It would be kind of fun to play against them.''

Matta downplayed the significance of the possible reunion, even though he was quoted as saying he wasn't a candidate for the Ohio State job during the summer of 2004, only to be hired by the university a week later.

''We've got to take care of our first game, as they do, and we'll see,'' Matta said. ''It's a little bit ironic. We were laughing about it.''

Regardless of where they are seeded and who they must face, the Buckeyes seem to be playing their best basketball at the right time. They won their three Big Ten tournament games by an average of 12.6 points and they beat Wisconsin by 17 yesterday after the first two meetings between the top teams in the league were decided by a total of four points.

''To be sitting at 30-3 and having won 17 straight games and two of our losses are to No. 1 seeds that were ahead of us, I'm pretty excited with where we are today,'' Matta said.

jlloyd@morningjournal.com