Rewards standings before the tournament games and after them.

Commentary: The top four teams in the pre-tournament polls appear in a slightly different order in the Rewards ranking, but after that, there was much disagreement between the voters and this other objective, evaluative measure of the overall team's performance for this year. Duke, the #1 team in both polls, but the #4 as determined by Rewards, did not make the Elite Eight, whereas the top three teams in the Rewards order all made the Final Four.

In the post-tournament rankings, Indiana, the other Final Four participant, moved up from #42 to #34, as their 11 losses prevented them from moving up much further than that, given how those are used in the Rewards calculation. Elite Eight teams also migrated closer to the top: Kent State went from #27 to #11, and Missouri from #44 to #35. Southern Illinois moved up from #39 to #30 with its two NCAA wins, and NIT champion Memphis elevated from #48 to #39.