That’s all I have to say, especially to those folks who heeded my admonition that “it has never happened that all four 1’s advance to the Final Four”.  I’ve been watching this tournament a long time, and I do not ever recall seeing a collection of top seeds so much in a class by themselves with respect to the rest of the field.  After so many first and second round thrillers, the vast majority of the third round and regional final games were utter blowouts.  Only Xavier over West Virginia in OT and, tonight, Kansas over Davidson were games that I didn’t half sleep through.

The scoring graphic read DAVID and KANSAS, but it should have said DAVID and GOLIATH.  This incarnation of David nearly lived up to the name.  In between sharing pizza and fellowship with 13 of the finest 7th and 8th graders on the planet (props to my small group, yo!), I was able to watch most of the first half and the final 4 minutes of this game.  Kansas coach Bill Self, loosely quoted, said before the game, “Anyone who thinks Davidson is an underdog is fooling himself.”  No kidding.  In case you missed it, Kansas was up 2 with about 16 seconds to play.  Davidson had the ball.  Unfortunately, when this David reached into the bad, all the stones were gone.  The amazing Stephen Curry passed up what appeared to be a golden opportunity to drive the lane for the tying score, opting to head back out for the winning three.  Kansas recovered their double team, and Curry could not get open.  He passed to Richards, who took an NBA three-pointer at the buzzer that barely drew rim.  Game over.  Kansas survives, and I do mean survives.

“All too easy,” said Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back.  That’s exactly how I feel about this year’s Final Four.  Normally, I would give an award to anyone who picked all four Final Four teams correctly with original picks.  This year, that list contains a ridiculous 41 names!  Throw in the folks who got all four via the re-pick round, and the list grows to 63.  Go look it up yourself.  I’m not giving no stinking award to 41 people.  Hmph.

The We Don’t Need No Stinking Free Throws award goes to the Memphis Tigers, who seem to be proving that you do not need at least nominal free throw shooting to win tournament games.  Why would you when you can dunk your way to a 30-point halftime lead?  These guys are monsters.  They took a very good Texas team and made them look like a 16 seed.  And speaking of monsters…

Somebody take away the Miracle Gro from Tyler Hansbrough.  This guy gets the Energizer Bunny award; he just keeps going, and going, and going, and going. 

Three in a row – that’s how many Final Fours UCLA has appeared in.  That’s impressive on any level.  The last two years this really ugly dude named Joakim Noah got in their way.  I’m not sure they’ll fair much better against the aforementioned collection of ugly dudes from Memphis, but this year they do have their own version of Big Ugly, a 6-foot-everything great white behemoth named Love.  I’m telling you, folks, when these two teams meet next Saturday, the backboards might explode.

Clash of the Titans.  Immovable objects and irresistible forces.  Pull out your favorite cliche.  They all apply.  How do you pick a winner from among such a fearsome group of foes?  My pick was Kansas from the beginning, more because I wanted to differentiate from all the folks on the UNC bandwagon than because I thought Kansas was actually the best.  Any of these four teams could win it.  Any of them would deserve it.  Let’s hope these last three games are competitive and entertaining.

And now, for the Round 4 Awards

The Southern Hospitality award goes to three contestants who picked all 15 games in the South regional correctly with original picks: Amanda Barton, Jim Buchanan, and Tony Caraway.  Incidentally, these three are the only folks who picked any of the four regions perfectly with original picks.

The Mulligan Award goes to two contestants who picked all 15 games in the East regional correctly, but needed at least one changed pick in the re-pick round to do it: Bryson Davis and TJ Niksich.

The Wild, Wild, West award, sponsored by Will Smith, goes to three contestants who managed 13 wins with their original picks in this difficult region: Jeremy Bolin, Stan Hand, and Robert Tipton.

The You Must Have Had An Easy Button award, sponsored by Staples, goes to Jason Ritchie and Trevis Litherland, both of whom picked an amazing 13 games correctly with original picks in the very difficult Midwest region.  Throw in the re-picks, and Trevis missed only one game in the Midwest.  This is probably why he’s also in second place.

The One And Done award goes to Bob Hillman, who “accomplished” the incredible feat of winning one, solitary game in the South regional with original picks.

It’s one thing to lose all or most of one’s Final Four in early rounds of the contest, which some folks did and always do.  It’s quite another to have your Final Four teams make it to the Elite Eight only to lose en masse.  This year’s Schleprock award goes to two contestants who picked three out of four losers for the Final Four: Scott Bauer (Louisville, Texas, Xavier) and David Ayres (Louisville, Texas, Davidson).  Tough luck, fellas.

The Jimmy Neutron award for childhood genius goes to five kids who picked the Final Four correctly with original picks: Amber Little,Matthew Barndt, Devan Bailey, Andrew Barndt, and Zoey Glassley.  HOPEFULLY…none of these “kids” are really their parents in disguise. 🙂

And finally, it’s only fair to recognize our continuing contest leader, Robert “Smoke” Tipton, with the Up In Smoke award, given in honor of the fact that his national champion, Texas, went down in flames today.  With only a two-point lead over Trevis Litherland and his brainy bracketology program, it is unlikely that Smoke will hold on to win.

With 63 folks who can still win the remaining three games, there will definitely be some shuffling in the upper 100 before the final scores are tallied.  Time, once again, to take a deep breath and get back to real life.  Until we meet again on Final Four Saturday, this is Jeff the exasperated contest manager saying, “Some day, I’m going to win this thing.”

Maybe I should have entitled this edition of the commentary “Enough Is Enough” or “Enough Already!”  Tonight’s games were won by a total of a whopping 70 points!  The only game that was even remotely exciting was so only because it was this year’s Cinderella, Davidson, that was putting on a second-half clinic for Wisconsin.  Davidson’s performance was truly impressive as they essentially out-badgered the Badgers with in-your-face defense.  The were completely outplayed in the second half.  This game really shook up the standings, because the few folks who picked Davidson to win from the beginning scored a 9-point Scategories bonus in addition to the 7-point upset bonus for a total of 16 points for that one game.

Elite Eight By The Numbers – This year’s Elite Eight is comprised of 5 teams from the Big 6 conferences and 3 from “elsewhere”.  Half of the eight are the four top seeds.  The remaining four consist of a two seed, two three seeds, and a ten that looks more like a three or four.  The Big 12 has two teams remaining, while the vaunted Big East has one, along with the ACC and Pac-10.  Seven of the eight remaining teams have an animal for a mascot.  Only Xavier is human.

Which One Is Done?  Every year I point out that it has never happened that all four number 1 seeds advance to the Final Four.  All four top seeds still remain this year, and for history to hold serve, one of them has to lose this weekend.  Who is it most likely to be?

• North Carolina? The Tarheels face what looks like a very strong Louisville team, but are they strong enough?  No, I don’t think so.  Louisville will make a game of it, but UNC is on a mission, and will not be deterred.
• Kansas? Davidson is an awesome Cinderella story, and Stephen Curry is unbelievable.  However, no number 10 has ever advanced to the Final Four, and so it would be easy to say that this one is also a no-brainer.  That’s exactly what a certain Connecticut team thought last year when 11-seed George Mason entered the gym.  45 minutes later, George Mason was going to the Final Four.  Kansas should win this game, but never underestimate Kansas’ ability to fold in the tournament or lose to a mid-major.
• Memphis? Ok, I’ll admit I thought these guys were the most vulnerable one seed, and I picked them to lose to Michigan State.  They must have tacked my commentary from last week on their bulletin board, because they looked unstoppable tonight.  I still think that in a close game, their woeful free throw shooting will be their undoing.  If Texas can keep the game close, I like their chances.
• UCLA? Of all the top seeds, UCLA has been the one with the closest calls so far.  In addition, they face a formidable opponent in Xavier on a mission to avenge last year’s bitter defeat at the hands of Ohio State.  If I had to pick one top seed that I thought was most likely to lose this weekend, I think I would go with UCLA.

From The Mouth Of Babes– So I’m sitting on the couch watching the end of the Memphis game with my oldest daughter, Andrea.  For some reason they showed a brief clip of a tournament game from 1979, and my daughter remarked with absolute sincerity, “Woah!  Look at how short those shorts are!”  Does anyone remember exactly when basketball shorts grew to knee length?  Maybe it was the Michigan Fab 5 that was the original Baggy Britches Brigade.

Ok, so I think I’m fresh out of interesting things to say about tonight’s games, because tonight’s games weren’t that interesting.  Therefore, let us move on to more important matters such as the round 3 awards.

The Perfect Picker With An Asterisk award goes to three contestants who picked all eight of the Elite Eight correctly.  This award comes with an asterisk, however, because all three contestants needed the re-pick round to accomplish this feat.  No contestant picked all eight correctly with original picks.  The winners are Dan Jones, RJ Wynn, and Yardley Glassley.  Yardley gets a gold star instead of an asterisk for having such a unique first name.

The Biggest Loser award, sponsored by Caroline Rhea, goes to Bob Hillman, who dropped 213 spots from 94 to 307 in round 3, and Josh Christopherson, who dropped 96 spots from 16 to 112.

The My Better Is Better Than Your Better award, sponsored by LaDanian Tomlinson, goes to Tony Teasley, who climbed 301 spots from 399 to 98, and Jonathan Hand, who climbed 55 spots from 69 to 14.

The Ocho Cinco Award Of Spanish Illiteracy, sponsored by the one and only Chad Johnson, goes to the contestant who just happens to be in position 85, Paul Schnaitter.  For the record, 85 in Spanish is ochenta y cinco.

The Looks Like It Could Be The Couch For You award goes to Andrew Ables, whose wife, Christine, proclaimed through her alias that her only goal was to beat him.  While Andrew’s rank is a none-to-impressive 352, that is still much better than 5 from the bottom, where Christine sits. 

The Don’t Look Now But Your Kid Is Beating You award goes to Wayne Murray, whose youngest son, Elliott, is two positions ahead of him.

The Crash And Burn award goes to Vanessa Sopke, one time top-20 contestant who has dropped to 69.  I hope it was fun while it lasted.

The No Guts, No Glory award goes to Jason Dukes, who picked Davidson for the Final Four with an original pick.  If that actually happens, Mr. Dukes will earn 24 points with a trueScategories bonus.  He is the only contestant out of 444 to pick Davidson for the Final Four.

The Better Luck Next Year award goes to seven contestants who have lost alltheir remaning teams: Al Davis, Jacob Alles, Maria Randazzo, Rebecca Davis, Josh Christopherson, and Bob Hillman.  For these seven, there is truly nowhere to go but down in the standings.

And finally, the Wire To Wire award goes to the man who is still the contest leader, Robert “Smoke” Tipton.  Robert’s lead is commanding, but not insurmountable.  If you’re chasing Robert, root against Texas, his national champion.

Final four is determined this weekend.  Let’s hope for some more competitive games.

From time to time I find myself fondly recalling my younger years, when mullets were in style, Saturday morning cartoons were still funny, reality TV consisted of that white guy with the ‘fro on PBS teaching you how to paint, and School House Rock taught a generation of kids useful things like proper English grammar and accurate American history in a fun and memorable way.  Thus, the title of tonight’s post is a nod to that great American icon, School House Rock.  Now let’s all sing the Preamble to the Constitution together, shall we?  “We the people…”

Getting back to the business at hand, both 3 seeds that played tonight won, albeit in decidedly different fashion.  Xavier barely escaped the clutches of West Virginia, whom I honestly think deserves both the Choke Artist award, sponsored by Reggie Miller, and the Boneheaded Play of the Day award for allowing…whoever that nameless nobody for Xavier was…get the cross-court inbounds pass with 2 seconds left on the shot clock for a wide open three pointer that sealed the win in overtime.  Xavier got the four point lead, and I got the four point shaft.  (If you’re lost, a WVU win was worth four upset bonus points.)

Louisville, on the other hand, absolutely manhandled a confused and totally discombobulated Tennessee team.  No doubt this will spark even more discussion amongst the talking heads on CBS and ESPN concerning the dominance of the Big East this year.  I’d like to point out that the Big Ten, supposedly the weakest conference in the tournament this year, is 5-2 so far, which is the best win/loss percentage amongst the Big 6 power conferences, and the Big Ten joins the Big 12 as the only conferences with two teams remaining in the field.  (Granted, the Big East also had two before tonight’s games.  We’ll wait for tomorrow’s results, and then we’ll talk about it.)

Does anyone besides me wonder who of the remaining 11 teams has any chance in the world of beating North Carolina?  Maybe it will be different when they’re not playing in their home state, but that wasn’t the 16 or 9 seed pretender they thumped tonight.  Wazzu (thanks to all the Washington State faithful for your lenghty and informative explanations of that term and it’s proper spelling) came in to this game allowing just over 40 points per game in their two tournament wins.  They barely scored 40 tonight while giving up 68 to the billy goats in powder blue.

I believe in miracles, but not when it comes to history-making upsets in March Madness.  16’s don’t beat 1’s, and neither do 12’s.  The Hilltoppers of Western Kentucky made their game against UCLA interesting for about 5 minutes, but in general, the first Sweet 16 ever to feature two 12 seeds didn’t offer much drama from the first one to play.  12 seeds are now 0-14 all time against top seeds, and as much as I like Villanova, after tomorrow’s date with Kansas, it’s going to be 0-15.

Random Stuff I’m Tired Of Hearing While Watching March Madness

• “Buddy, sweetie, honey, what’s up, what’s shakin’, what’s happenin'” – Nothing like being treated to the first microsecond of two dozen peoples’ phone coversation.
• Fitty Cent pretending to direct some orchestra playing “In Da Club” – Does anyone remember what product that commercial is promoting?  Didn’t think so.
• “Daaaa, daaa, da-dat-dat daaaa” and the words “taste infringement” – Those guys need to have a Coke and a smile and chill out
• Tiger Woods’ name – and I’m a big Tiger Woods fan
• “I’m a new soul, I came to this strange world, Hoping I could learn a bit bout how to give and take” – Does anyone believe that Apple’s entire hardware portfolio consists of anything other than glorified MP3 players by now?

I will say that I never get tired of those ETrade commercials with the talking baby.  My favorite is the one where he says he told his buddies he was going to rent a clown with all that “extra coin” he earned through the stock market.  You can see the clown from the chest down in the background, and then the baby says, “I really underestimated the creepiness.”  Classic.

And now for a few awards…

The You Obviously Aren’t Taking This Contest Too Seriously award goes to Josh Christopherson, who could have easily solidified his position in the top 15 for the remainder of the contest by simply re-picking his losers in the final 15 games.  Alas, he didn’t, and with only four winnable games remaining at the 6:00 PM deadline, there’s pretty much nowhere for Josh to go but down.  Obviously, Josh doesn’t understand how important this whole thing really is.  (Spoken with tongue firmly planted in cheek.)

The Rags To Riches award goes to Sammy Brauen, whose perfect 4 for 4 tonight prompted a meteoric rise from 118th to 15th!  Way to go, Sammy!

Not to be outdone, Emma Dean lost 3 out of 4 tonight and plummetted from 24th to 255th, earning her the Black Thursday award for crashing her stock in a most spectacular way.

The It’s All Greek To Me award goes to Dave Barndt, whose latin alias “Sibili Si Ergo, Fortibuses In Ero” means, according to tranexp.com, absolutely nothing sensible at all.  He is, however, in 5th place, also going 4 for 4 in tonight’s games.

The At Least You Got One Prediction Right award goes to Evan Gidley, who brashly proclaimed through his alias “I’m Going To Beat Jeff!”  Unless Davidson pulls off the miracle for me tomorrow night, that is probably going to turn out to be the case.

And with that, I sign off until tomorrow, at which time I’ll present the final Round 3 awards.  Stay tuned!

You know how it feels when something so stressful, so tense, so traumatic happens that all the blood rushes from your extremities to your vital organs?  That’s exactly what happened to me this afternoon in the closing seconds of Tennessee vs. Butler.  After Tennessee’s J.P. Prince made the Boneheaded Play Of The Day by switching pivot feet with 4 seconds to play, Butler’s A.J. Graves couldn’t get a decent shot at the end of regulation.  As great as this game was, it has to make one wonder why two teams who both spent time in the top 10 during the regular season and who both had 30 wins on the season were playing each other in the second round.  One possible, and dare I say probable, explanation is that Duke was favored and Butler was hosed by the selection committee.  What if Butler gets Duke’s 2 seed in the West?  Does Butler beat West Virginia and march on to a possible Final Four appearance?  Maybe, and maybe not, but that seems a lot more just for a team of Butler’s accomplishments than being punished for its success by being dumped in a region with two teams that have been ranked #1 nationally, and as a 7 seed, no less.  Butler deserved a 2 or 3, Duke deserved a 4 or 5, and…

Georgetown Deserves A Big Fat Goose Egg.  I’ve said repeatedly, among friends, that Georgetown simply does not know how to properly utilize Hibbert, and today proved my point.  Hibbert fouled out with 6 points.  6 points and 5 fouls for the guy who should be the best and biggest thing to hit the Big East since the Great Orang-u-tan himself, Patrick Ewing.  They didn’t show much of this game to us here in Indiana today, but if I were to make a guess, I would guess that Hibbert wasted his time setting up high on offense instead of on the block, shooting turnaround jumpers, or worse, three pointers, and compounded his ineffectiveness by picking up cheap frustration fouls, thus riding the pine more than he played.  If you saw the game, tell me if I’m close.  Speaking of Georgetown players from the past…

I thought I was watching Allen Iverson as I caught whatever glimpses CBS would give me of Davidson’s Stephen Curry dropping 30 big ones on the Hoyas.  If you’re keeping score at home, that’s 70 points in two tournament games for this kid.  I’m very anxious to see what he can do against Wisconsin’s beat-on-you-until-you-surrender style defense.

While we’re talking about overrated teams, does anyone besides me believe that Memphis’ sheer ineptitude from the free throw line essentially guarantees that they will not run the table?  Remember hack-a-Shaq?  With Memphis, you can hack-a-just-about-anyone.  This is the biggest, meanest, most explosive collection of bricklayers ever assembled.  The trouble they had with Mississippi State is very telling, and I think Michigan State can grind it out with them and bring their run-and-gun offense to a standstill.  In March Madness, you have to close out games at the line.  Memphis cannot do this.  It was during this game that I heard a great quip from one of my favorite color commentators, Bill Raftery.  Speaking of a player’s free throw percentage, he said, “Anything under 50 and you’re not picking the team in the summer.”

13 Not So Lucky In The Second Round.  Neither of the 13 seeds were able to get over the hump against their 12 seeded opponents.  San Diego was actually within striking distance with under 5 minutes to go, but Siena was never really competitive.  Guess we’ll be Si-en-ya next year (and a groan escapes from the crowd).

Re-pick Round Reminder

Before we got on to the round 2 awards, I want to remind you that we are entering the re-pick phase of the contest.  Everyone’s picks will be password protected again until Thursday at 6:00 PM EDT.  From now until then, you are free to change any of your picks for the remaining 15 games if you wish.  The complete, detailed instructions for entering your re-picks can be found here, but let me give you a summary.

1. Go to your contestant picks page.  The easiest way to do this is to go to the Contestant Picks list and use the search tool to find your picks quickly. 
2. Enter your password.
3. Understand what you are looking at.  Please do not email me saying “Hey, I didn’t pick that team!” Yes, I know.  Any pick that you had wrong in rounds 1 and 2 will show up red in your grid, but the actual winner will be filled in for you.  This is so that you can pick any of the remaining 16 teams to win any of the remaining games that you wish.
4. Make your changes and click submit.  You can make changes as often as you like up until the deadline.
5. Good piece of advice #1: You should definitely change your picks for any game that shows up as red in your grid for any of the remaining rounds (3, 4, 5, and 6).  It is foolish to leave a pick unchanged when you selected a team that has already lost.  Pick a different team and give yourself a chance to score some points.
6. Good piece of advice #2: Remember that if you change a pick for a team that is still alive, your new pick is worth fewer points if you win it than your original pick.  This is my favorite part of the contest, because it is the most sadistic.  If you have a team picked that you are now doubting as a winner, and you don’t change it because you want to keep the chance of scoring more points, and they lose, you will hate yourself for not changing the pick.  On the other hand, if you change the pick, and your original choice wins, you will hate yourself.  I love this game.  🙂

Enough of the technicalities.  It’s time for…

The Round 2 Awards

The Baker’s Dozen award, sponsored by Krispy Kreme, goes to the four contestants who picked 13 of the Sweet 16 correctly, which is the most anyone got correct in our contest: Mason Ables, Brad Schafer, Robert Tipton, and Nicki Austin.

The Mary Poppins Practically Perfect In Every Way award goes to those fine contestants who managed to pick all 12 games in any one region correctly.  There were no such winners this year in either the wild, wild West or Midwest, but for the relatively easy East we had: Bryson Davis, Caleb Davis, Dave Wilson, David Kincheloe, EJ Carroll, Ruth Allender, Scott Bateson, Steve Blevins, Steve Glassley, TJ Niksich, and Tom Kline.  For the almost-as-easy South, we had: Amanda Barton, Bill DeWandeler, Ethan Ables, Jim Buchanan, Sam Glassley, and Tony Caraway.

The Who Invented This Stupid Scoring System? award goes to Brooks Targgart, who has the best win-loss record in our contest at 39-9, but is in 39th place and a full 40 points behind the leader.

The This Scoring System Is The Best Thing Since Guitar Hero Came Out award goes to Josh Christopherson, the highest-ranking contestant (13th) with more losses than wins.

The Donald Trump Would Fire You award goes to the two contestants whose position dropped the most in round 2.  John Foster dropped from 226 to 409, and Emma Dean plummeted from 24 to 143.

The Rumors Of My Bankruptcy Are Greatly Exaggerated award, sponsored by Bear Sterns, goes to the two contestants whose position rose the most in round 2.  Chris Deaver climbed from 323 to 88, and Michael Hoback clawed his way from 145 into the top 25 at position 22.

The It’s Obviously Personal award goes to Rebecca Davis, who is using her alias to announce to all that I’m BEATING MY BOSS, Pastor Jason!!!!!  There goes your raise this year.

The Kind Words Are Appreciated, But It Won’t Get You Any More Points goes to my beloved aunt, Patty Brown.  Thanks for the props, Patty!

The Quick, Somebody Crash His Hard Drive award goes to my good friend, Trevis Litherland, who makes his picks yearly using a computational algorithm he developed years ago and tweaked along the way.  Trevis’s formula is in second place, 10 points behind the leader.

The You Beginner Luck award, given in honor of the late Noriyuki “Pat” Morita, goes to contest rookie Robert “Smoke” Tipton, the current contest leader with 106 points.  When I made the call for contest rookies to identify themselves, Robert sent me this comment.  “Interesting concept…I haven’t figured out exactly how different my strategy should be…I just picked a bunch of upsets, figuring the few that hit would outscore the favorites trudging onward.”  That’s what you figured, huh?  Well, bless your little heart.  If I had known it was that simple all these years, I would have won my own contest by now.  Yes, I’m bitter. 🙂

That’s it for this week, hoops fanatics.  Thanks for hanging with me, and thanks especially for all the kind emails you’ve been sending.  I read them all.  Don’t forget to do your re-picks this week, and may the best contestant prevail.

Jeff, Suffering From Insomnia and Hoops Overload

This day will be remembered for two things: the day my bracket went up in smoke, and the day Smoke smoked everyone else in the contest.  More on that in a moment.

Quotes Of The Day

“I think I’m the tallest building here.” Michael Beasley, speaking of Manhattan, Kansas, site of Kansas State University.

“It bears repeating that Kyle Weaver is the first player in Pac 10 history to have 1000 points, 500 rebounds, 400 assists, 150 steals, and 50 blocks.” Len Elmore, reciting the impressive pedigree of Wazzu’s star player.  I think he forgot the partridge in a pear tree.

In Today’s Games…

Now I know why they call them “badgers”.  Playing Wisconsin is like getting mauled by one.  Watching them play is like getting a root canal; no matter how good of a job is done, it’s still extremely unpleasant.  Pads and helmets should be required when playing these guys.

Can’t Broadcast Sports– You know, I was actually going to give CBS a little credit this year.  They restored my favorite broadcasting tandem of Len Elmore and Gus Johnson.  Dick Enberg and Jay Bilas are also an appealing combination.  Even Seth Davis doesn’t seem nearly as annoying this year as he has been in the past.  Today snapped me out of my brief moment of insanity.  I received a text message from Zach Richardson today wondering why we here in Indiana were forced to endure the final five minutes of Xavier’s pasting of Purdue while the entire first half of Notre Dame vs. Wazzu passed by.  (Zach is an ND fan, but I’m sure you figured that part out.)  Not to be outdone, CBS treated us to the final two compelling minutes of Wazzu’s stunning 20 point victory.  I saw the Wazzu players smiling and high-fiving on the bench.  I saw them dribble out the last 10 meaningless seconds of the clock.  I saw the coaches amicably shake hands.  Meanwhile, I’m watching the box score of the Stanford vs. Marquette game in the upper right corner of my screen.  I’m watching it go back and forth between one-point leads, while the clock ticks down toward 0:00, and my TV screen is covered with spittle.  Thanks, CBS, for sparing me the excitement of the final two minutes of a close contest that eventually went to OT so that I could enjoy the lopsided victory of a school 2000 miles away. Grrrrr…

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape, you don’t spit into the wind, you don’t pull the mask off the old Lone Ranger and you don’t…pick against Tom Izzo in March.  So much for the red-hot Pittsburgh Panthers, and so much for my bracket.  That’s what I get for taking advice from The General. 

Coaches Gone Wild – What’s up with the coaches, this year?  Yesterday, Villanova coach Jay Wright nearly costs his team the game by getting a technical with a four point lead and less than 2 minutes to play.  Today, Stanford coach Trent Johnson got himself ejected before the end of the first half.  You could see the assistant coach burying his face in his hands in the video coverage.  Fortunately for Stanford, Trent’s understudy managed to put together a thrilling overtime victory over Marquette.

Take me home, country road.  The highest seed to exit the Madness thus far is our not-so-beloved Duke Blue Devils, who, despite my comments from a couple of days ago, made a strong case for being both overrated and overseeded this year.  A one-point squeaker over the 15 seed followed by a convincing defeat to the 7 seed lead one to believe that Duke got the benefit of name recognition from the committee this year.

And now for a few awards…

The Did You Really Make Those Picks? award goes to young prognosticator Olivia Klinker, currently in third place.

The Call Guinness award goes to four-week old Mason Ables, currently in 18th place.  Wow, now that’s one precocious infant.

The Miami Heat award goes to Bob Hillman, who has managed an impressive 27 lossesso far, but still ranks in the top 100 at 59th.

The All You Find In The Middle Of The Road Are Yellow Lines And Dead Skunks award goes to Jim Buchanan, our 50th percentile contestant in 222nd place.

The I Need To Put You To Work On This Thing Next Year award goes to Jason Roehl, the human calculator, who always seems to be forwarding me fascinating statistical analyses of the contest.  Earlier today he noticed that exactly two contestants had a win/loss percentage below .500, and yet both ranked in the top 20.  In honor of that observation…

The Who Needs A Good Batting Average When All Your Hits Are Homers award goes to those sub-.500 contestants who rank in the top 25: Dave Barndt at 14th and Josh Christophersonat 17th.

The Nowhere To Go But Up award goes to last-place contestant Tony “Trichevy” Teasley.  The repick round begins on Monday.

The Most Impressive Performance award goes to Robert “Smoke” Tipton, our contest leader who is definitely in a strong position.  Smoke has picked every upset so far except for Michigan State over Pittsburgh.  That is exactly why his closest competitor is 10 points behind him.

Remember all those crazy upsets yesterday?  Their consequences come home to roost tomorrow.  Specifically, we will see a Scategories bonus be awarded to a special handful of contestants tomorrow.  That is because a second round win by either San Diego or Western Kentucky qualifies for a Scategories bonus, and those two teams play each other.  That game is worth 6 or 7 points, depending on who wins.  Additionally, if Siena were to topple Villanova, the game would be worth a whopping 14 pointsto the winners.  Now for the bad news.  Our contest leader picked Siena.  Root accordingly.

Jeff, Hoops Idiot

We would all agree that what makes March Madness, well, maddeningly interesting are the improbable wins by those double-digit seeds.  These are the true upsets, the most thrilling moments, and, appropriately, the most rewarding picks in the contest.  There have been years when unusual numbers of these would-be cinderellas have prevailed, but never quite like this.

You’ve heard of the Tampa 2?  How about the Tampa 12?  Or the Tampa 13?  For the first time in tournament history, all four underdog seeds won at the same site on the same day.  Western Kentucky, Villanova, Siena, and San Diego all prevailed in an unprecedented parade of perplexing, and perhaps even vexing, upsets.  If you haven’t done the math by now, this means that on Sunday we will be treated to not one, but two 12-13 matchups played in the same location, no less.  It also means we are guaranteed two double-digit seeds in the Sweet 16 this year.

The Wild, Wild West, and the even wilder Midwest regionals have proven exceedingly difficult to predict this year.  With only the first round done, not a single contestant out of 444 managed to get all 8 games correct in eitherof those regionals.  On the other hand, the South and East have been relative cakewalks, with 41 and 39 contestants perfect in those regionals, respectively.

Flip This Contest – That is what today’s upsets essentially did.  At the beginning of the day, we had a handful of contestants with perfect records topping the leader board.  Now, the entire thing has been turned on its head, with the former losers who picked the big upsets vaulting to the top, and those who played it safe plummeting to the bottom.  That is what I personally love best about my contest.  It is not about picking the most games right.  It is about picking the right games right.

Before we get into rewarding the folks who have picked the right games right so far, let’s talk a little basketball.

Stick To Football – This past fall I had the pleasure of going to Boise to watch the Broncos, my favorite college football team, play on that bizarre but somehow strangely wonderful blue field.  You should have seen the looks I got from the locals when I explained to them that I had never been to Boise before and flew all the way out there from Indiana just to see the football game.  Anyway, it is apparent after tonight’s dismantling by Louisville that Boise State should stick to football.  Not much to write home about from this one if you’re a Boise State fan, but I did hear a rumor that the center proposed to a cheerleader after the game.

The Boneheaded Play Of The Day award goes to Villanova coach Jay Wright, who managed to get himself teed up in the final two minutes with his team leading by a mere 4 points.  Yes, Nova won the game, but for crying out loud, man, put a muzzle on it under those circumstances.  Mr. Wright might have ended up Mr. Wrong had those two technical free throws cost his team the game.

Does He Have George W. Bush’s Speechwriter?  Did anyone catch Indiana coach Dan Dakich’s post game interview?  Did you hear what he said?  Did you understandwhat he said?  Me neither.  I couldn’t find the transcript online, or I would put a quote here for you.  It reminded me of that computer program I’ve seen before that randomly pulls nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs out of a database and assembles them into sentences that are gramatically correct, but make no real sense.  This is extremely confusing to the brain, because the correct grammar makes you feel as though you ought to understand what is being said, but of course you don’t, because in reality nothing is being said.  Folks, I’m not exaggerating.  It went something like this.

“There are some things that are going to happen in the spring in the Indiana Basketball Program, because they need to happen as part of the Indiana Basketball culture.  No matter what happens with the coaching position, I am going to make sure that we do the things that are important to that culture.”

Huh?

More History Made – Connecticutt had never lost a first round game under coach Jim Calhoun until today’s overtime meltdown against San Diego.  In the postgame press conference, Coach Calhoun pulled out the late 90’s New York Knick’s defense by asserting that, even though they lost, the Huskies were the better team.  “We were a 4 seed because of what we did during the season, and how well we played.  We were the 4 seed, because we were the better team, but we didn’t play like a 4 seed, so we lost.”  Right.

Every dog may have his day, but that day is not today in March Madness.  Teams with dog mascots are 3-5.  Cats are least above .500 at 6-5.  This is the year of the strange and bizarre, apparently.  The wild animals, wierd (spelled correctly) sports figures, religious and plant kingdom are all undefeated.  Never bet against the saints, I guess.

Ok, enough jibber-jabber.  Time for the round 1 awards.

The Top Prognosticator award for round 1 goes to the contestant who picked the most games correctly out of 32.  This year’s winner is Taggart Brooks with 28 wins and only 4 losses.

The Even A Stopped Clock Is Right Twice A Day award for round 1 goes to the contestant who picked the fewest games correctly.  This year’s lucky winner is Bob Hillman, with an underwhelming record of 12 wins and 20 losses.  20 losses.  Wow.  Nevertheless, in the ultimate irony, Bob also receives the I Love This Awesome Scoring Systemaward, because even with those 20 losses, he currently sits not in last place as his alias proclaims, but in 13th.

The I Hate This Stupid Scoring System award goes to five contestants who are tied at 365th despite having a respectable record of 24-8: Brenda Shepherd, Judy Glassley, Matthew Barndt, Zoey Glassley, and Blake Dieringer.

The Baker’s Dozen award goes to everyone in the contest with the family name Davis, all thirteen of you.  The Brady Bunch Plus One award goes to the Glassley family who has nine entries this year.  We also have 7 Wilsons and Randazzos.  Truly, the contest is a family affair.

As you know, it’s the 10 year anniversary of Jared the Subway guy’s impressive weight loss.  In his honor, then, I will give the Biggest Loser award to Peggy Conaway, who dropped from 24th at the beginning of the day to 291st at the end.

The I Know An Upset When I See One award goes to four contestants who did the best job of picking those improbable upsets.  These contestants have 42 bonus points each!  That’s in addition to their base score of one point per first round game won.  The winners are Dave Barndt, Matthew Hand, Josh “Don’t Call Me Kris” Christopherson, and Robert Tipton. And finally, speaking of Robert Tipton…

While many of you watched your brackets go up in smoke today, I was watching Smoke go up the bracket.  Robert “Smoke” Tipton is our contest leader after round 1 with 63 points and a stupefying win-loss percentage of just .656.  You know what they say, “Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”  Our friend, Mr. Tipton, is certainly burning up the difficult picks, anyway.

That’s the round 1 recap.  Time for the contest manager to get a little shut eye and gear up for the second round.  I hope you are enjoying the contest so far.  Your kind emails of thanks and encouragement are truly appreciated.

Jeff, Humble Hoops Guy

Oh, what could have been.  Only four 15 seeds have ever won a tournament game.  Tonight, we nearly saw number 5.  Pop question, hot shots.  Who was the last 15 seed to win?  Bzzzzt.  Time’s up.  It was the Hampton Pirates in 2001, who defeated a supremely overrated and overseeded Iowa State team.  This, though, would not have been anything like that.  Duke is not overrated, nor overseeded.  Belmont nearly pulled off a miracle the likes of which hasn’t been seen since Villanova beat Georgetown in 1985.  (Wierdly, the team that won the national championship in 2001, the last time a 15 seed won a game?  You guessed it – Duke.)

Grape Ape – Did anyone ever watch that cartoon with the gigantic purple gorilla?  Me either, but I remember seeing one or two episodes as a young person, probably during periods of near catatonic boredom.  Anyway, Grape Ape’s canine pal was Beegle the Beagle, whom Grape Ape called Beegley Beagley.  By now you’re wondering what in the world this has to do with basketball, and the answer is nothing, of course, BUT watching Kansas State’s Michael Beasley makes we want to put on my best Grape Ape and say, “Score the rock, Beasley, Beasley”.  Actually, I think the comparison between Beasley Beasley and a 40 foot purple gorilla rather appropriate, don’t you? 

Wow, Missed That One – I thought I had a chance at a shocker by picking number 13 Winthrop over number 4 Wazzou. (aka Washington State.  While we’re on the subject, what’s the deal with “Wazzou”, anyway?  I mean, I can understand shortening Missouri to Mizzou, but how does Washington arrive at such an abbreviation?  Is it because they have Starbucks out the Wazzou?  I know this line of questioning is going nowhere, but these are the things that keep me awake at night.)  The only thing shocking about this game was the abominable final score of 71 – 40.  Maybe it’s points they have out the Wazzou.

Speaking Of Washington – I received a phone call yesterday from a random gentlemen in Walla Walla, Washington.  I, at age 37, honestly believed that Walla Walla was a purely fictional place until someone called me from there.

This Is Why 64 Teams Is At Least 4 Too Many – This is NCAA, Division I Men’s basketball, right?  So how is it that Mississippi Valley State managed to score 29 points against UCLA.  29 points, not in the first half, but in the entire game.  I saw the last 60 seconds of this game.  If that’s the best the South West Athletic Conference has to offer…

Ok, on to the important stuff.  With 16 games in the books, we have five contestants with perfect records.  It is impossible for me to know for sure, but I don’t recall that many players picking the first 16 games perfectly.  So, let’s begin by giving the Fab Five award to those five gentlemen: KJ Afterkirk, Ralph Forey, Brian Gaffney, Ryan Mathews, and Joey Inskeep.

The It Happens Every Year award goes to Bob Hillman, who, I know, already received an award, but I just have to recognize that he picked a 16 seed, Texas-Arlington, to go all the way.  Reference earlier comment about chimpanzee.

The So Far, You Missed award goes to Fess “Shootin’ For Last” Bryson.  So far, he is tied for 6th.

The You’re Still My Number One, sponsored by Verizon Wireless (it’s the network, of course), goes to my oldest daughter, Andrea Little.  She is going to need a little encouragement in the morning if she checks her picks with bright-eyed excitement only to find she’s in last place.  Andrea likes to win, and I know that comes as a great surprise to those of you who know me well.

The Victim Mentality award goes to 371st place Max Southern, whose alias seems to indicate a real problem with personal responsibility.

One award that I traditionally give out at the end of the contest is the rookie of the year award.  In order to do that, I need to know who all the rookies are.  If this is your first year ever to enter the contest, lease shoot me a quick email.

That’s all for now.  More news tomorrow.

Jeff “I Should Write For ESPN” Little

I feel like it’s Christmas morning.  “It’s finally here!”  The deadline has passed, and I am happy to report that we have a new record number of entries this year: 444!  Not only is that an enormous number of entries, but it also happens to be a palindromic number, which is interesting only to OCDs like me.

I offer my apologies for not sending out my usual pre-tournament musings about seeds, numbers, and statistics, but I’m unfortunately having to cut back a little bit in favor of mundane things like real work.  If you’re interested in that sort of thing, I direct you to the commentary from years past, where I have discussed those topics ad nauseum. 

It is with great pleasure, then, that I offer the opening contest awards.  These are just to wet your whistle until things really get rolling.

The Upset Stomach Award, sponsored this year by Tagumet HD-NCAA, goes to the contestant who “picked” the most first round upsets.  I use the word “picked” very loosely, since the winner of this award often appears as though he handed his bracket over to a chimpanzee.  This year’s winner is Bob Hillman, who picked 26 underdogs and only 6 favorites to win in the first round.  Bob, the “pick all the upsets” strategy has been tried before, and it has never worked.

The Some Day, Seven Will Be Lucky award goes to those contestants who picked a 7 seed to go to the Final Four.  Believe it or not, this has never happened.  This year’s winners are the Butler fans: Doris Goehringer, Jason Justice, Corey Davis, Vanessa Sopke, Charlie Hillman, and Olin Russum; the Gonzaga fans: Esther Wilson, Vanessa Sopke, and Bob Hillman; the West Virginia Fan: Rebecca Davis, and the Miami fan: Luke Gilbert.

Back by not-so-popular demand, the Napolean Dynamite award goes to the contestant with the most clever or most amusing alias.  There were several that made me laugh, such as I Don’t Pick Boogers, I Pick Winners, Every House Needs A John, and Pickin’, Then Grinnin’.  There were a couple I had to nuke.  (Please keep your aliases safe for young eyes.  I will be vigilant in policing that.)  But, because I’m a sucker for a good pun, I had to give this year’s award to RJ Wynn, otherwise known as The WYNNing Team.  The monicker is unlikely to be prophetic, however, since a quick glance at RJ’s bracket reveals that he picked like two upsets for the entire tournament.

The Cheaters Never Win award goes to Andrew Ables, who circumvented the one person, one entry rule on a technicality by “letting” his two children, one of which cannot even walk or talk, enter picks.  In fairness, I don’t think Andrew is alone in this practice.  You know who you are.  Maybe next year I should require photo ID.

As a final thought, let me encourage you to check out the blog.  If you register, you can submit your own comments and responses to the commentary as the contest moves along.  Also, if you are part of a private group and are wondering where you can see those standings, there is a link on your personal contestants picks page.

If you encounter anything on the website that doesn’t seem to be working, or if you think you should be part of a private group that is not showing up for you, just send me an email.

Good Luck!

Jeff, Exhausted Contest Manager