Tuesday, March 23, 2010

First Weekend of Madness Does Not Disappoint

The first weekend of March Madness concluded on Sunday as the pool of teams was condensed into the Sweet 16. Congratulations to all of the schools that have made it to the second weekend of this great sporting event. The biggest story of the weekend is obviously Kansas, the #1 overall seed, losing to Northern Iowa. Do I need to repeat that? I think America is still shocked from this upset. Kansas WAS the big beast of a team from the Big 12. They were #1 in nation with a 33-3 record. This is the team that 42% of ESPN Tournament Challenge players picked to win it all. Northern Iowa IS the team that beat Kansas from the small Missouri Valley conference that only gets 1 or 2 teams in the brackets each year. Seriously, did anyone even know about this team before Saturday? Well we definitely do now because they either destroyed your bracket hopes or significantly helped you move one step closer to winning it.

The other big bracket buster was of course the #2 seed Villanova getting beat by St Mary’s. St. Mary’s is looking really good right now. Omar Samhan is playing great. And you cannot forget all the Aussie players, especially freshman Matthew Dellavedova with his distracting black and white mouth guard. Baylor has also been playing well, but they better not overlook St. Mary’s. How could anybody at this point? I expect this to be a good matchup on Friday.

I also have to congratulate Cornell and Washington, the other two surprise teams in the tournament. Cornell upset Wisconsin and Washington upset New Mexico. Although, are there really any surprises anymore? It is called March MADNESS. I would include Kansas losing as part of what defines that madness. Speaking of madness, I have to mention to my favorite team in the tournament, Maryland. Maryland was one of the latest victims of the madness when they lost on a last second shot by Michigan State. It was brutal and heartbreaking, but what an exciting ending. This was one of many exciting endings over the weekend. I give Maryland a lot of credit for their quality season. I will definitely miss Eric Hayes and (sometimes) Greivis Vasquez next season.

Now that Maryland is out, go Syracuse and Kentucky! These are my two teams I picked to win it all in my money pools. Does anyone have all 4 of their final 4 teams left? Between Kansas and Villanova losing, all 3 of my important pools have been crushed. Luckily, I still have 3 out of 4 teams in each one. I am holding on to the small chance!

So below I have the Sweet 16 games listed. I decided to pick ahead of time so you can all ridicule or give me praise later. (Hopefully it’s praise.) I am sure one of the higher seeds I am picking will go down. My current picks are in bold:

Cornell vs. Kentucky

Butler vs. Syracuse

Washington vs. West Virginia

Xavier vs. Kansas State

Purdue vs. Duke

Tennessee vs. Ohio State (even though Ohio State will help me win my money pool)

Northern Iowa vs. Michigan State

Saint Mary’s vs. Baylor


ESPN March Madness bracket.
A glimpse of one of my brackets. Click to enlarge.

Good luck to everyone in their pools and enjoy the rest of March Madness! You will hear from me again soon.
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4 comments:

  1. Need to check this out, from the always dependable Sports Bog on washingtonpost.com:

    http://voices.washingtonpost.com/dcsportsbog/2010/03/gary_williams_gets_choked_up_o.html

    This is why Gary Williams is a HOF coach, what a great interview. Still devastated every time I see that game-winning shot for MSU - keep hoping that the ball will clank off the rim every time. But as brutal as that ending was for us Terps fans, you said it best, it was an exciting, well-played game. One of the great games of this year's tournament (right now I say 2nd best after UNI's upset over Kanas) and probably one of the best of the last decade. As difficult as it may be to cope with it now, I'm sure we'll all come to appreciate this game many years from now. I'll too miss Vasquez, Hayes, and Milbourne - it was a great four years watching them play here at MD. On that note, always GO TERPS!!!

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  2. another great article:

    http://www.testudotimes.com/2010/3/22/1384831/thoughts-on-greivis-vasquez-and

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  3. GO BIG BLUE!
    ♥♥♥#15♥♥♥

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  4. yo Drew, you should listen to Scott Van Pelt (ESPN's resident Terp) pretty much sharing the same thoughts that I had of the game ... the link is below

    http://espn.go.com/espnradio/player?rd=1#/podcenter/?callsign=ESPNRADIO&id=5018999&autoplay=1

    ReplyDelete


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