“I can calculate the motion of heavenly bodies, but not the madness of people.” – Isaac Newton

Before I get started, minions, we need a quick English lesson. The word “mad” is used improperly by, in my estimation, about 95% of the American population. Actually, perhaps that is unfair, because I am measuring what is proper by the word’s original definition, which, without doubt, has been lost in the modern connotation. Ask an American, “Are you mad?” and he will respond with an assessment of whether or not he is angry that you poured Pepsi all over his new iPad in your post-game celebration. Ask an Englishman the same question, and he will respond with an assessment of his own sanity. One of the many reasons to love March Madness is its preservation of the proper definition of madness, an insanity, a craziness that defies sense and reason.

Today was a day of madness the Hatter himself could have never conceived. Four overtime games (a first in NCAA tournament history), three double-digit upsets, two buzzer beaters, and a partridge in a pear tree.  It’s Christmas in March for a college basketball fan. Someone pass the Pepto.

Evening Session Observations

• Hack-A-Pack to Get The Win – Let’s start with the game that was perhaps the most bizarre of the day. The NC State Wolfpack had Saint Louis dead to rites, leading by as many as 16 points. But then the Billikens (what in the world is a Billiken, by the way), no doubt tipped off by some nerdy number cruncher in the press box, employed the dreaded Hack-A-Shaq strategy (or in this case, Hack-A-Pack), daring NC State to beat them at the line. The result? NC State shot a whopping 37 free throws, but they missed an even more astounding 17 of them! Please note the aforementioned lead they once held of 16 points. This was a game that NC State won, then lost, only to miraculously seem to win again, only to ultimately snatch defeat right from the jaws of victory. The Reggie Miller Choke Artist award definitely goes to the Wolfpack today.
• Someone keeps pressing that Buffalo Wild Wings button – This was an amusing quote Doug Gottleib repeated twice during his coverage of games in Spokane. He was making reference to those goofy commercials where everyone is in the restaurant watching a game that is essentially over, but no one wants to go home. So, an employee presses the magic button, and something completely random happens to send the game into overtime. That seemed to happen repeatedly today, especially in that Spokane location. First, Oklahoma star Isaiah Cousins inexplicably fouled North Dakota State’s Taylor Braun with 32 seconds remaining and a four point lead. This set the stage for the Bison’s dramatic comeback including a tying three pointer with 12 seconds left. Then in the night cap, San Diego State needed only to inbound the ball with 15 seconds left and a three point lead. That’s when Xavier Thames took his eye off the ball and fumbled it out of bounds, leading to New Mexico State’s Kevin Aronis hitting the game tying three pointer from the parking lot with 9 seconds to go.  Fortunately for the Aztecs, they ended up winning that game in OT.
• You, me, and Dupree – Speaking of North Dakota State, their star player, Taylor Braun, after having Nike tattooed on his forehead by a stumbling Isaiah Cousins, fouled out with 1:14 to go in OT. In comes freshman Carlin Dupree, who has spent the first 44 minutes of this game riding the pine. He gets fouled, and this freshman with a 58% free throw percentage calmly makes both free throws to put them up by two. Thirty seconds later he makes a clutch layup in traffic to put the Bison up by four, and they never looked back.
• It’s not FEE-lix, it’s fa-LEEKS – One of the more interesting aspects of March Madness to me is finding players with unique or even funny names, and today’s offering had a few worth mentioning. There was Texas guard Javan Felix, who apparently pronounces his name with the accent on the second syllable. Then there was St. Louis’ Austin McBroom, who most certainly was a McDonald’s All American. Then there was NC State’s TJ Warren, whom I think would be more accurately addressed as TJ Whiner given his reaction to calls he didn’t like and just about any other bit of adversity throughout the game. And let’s not forget UConn’s Shabazz Napier, not to be confused with the 1970’s campy super hero TV show Shazam. I’m sure Shabazz has his sights set on winning the whole shabang,
• We don’t need no steenking subs – That’s apparently the philosophy of the St. Joe’s Hawks, who basically play five players the entire game. This works great until the game goes into overtime and one of your permanent five fouls out, which is exactly what happened.
• And then there’s Manhattan, the anti-St. Joe’s, who played 11 players liberally in hopes of toppling mighty Louisville. The interesting quirk in this game was that Manhattan’s coach was a former assistant of Louisville coach Rick Pitino.  At one point sideline reporter Erin Andrews (I think it was her. It sure sounded like her.) reported that Manhattan’s coach was actually calling out Louisville’s plays to his guys so they would know what was coming on defense. I think that definitely deserves the Bill Belichick Award For Creative Coaching, don’t you?
• Bringing the Payne – Perhaps the marquee performance of the day came from Michigan State’s Adrian Payne who scored a whopping 41 points including a perfect 17-17 from the free throw line in Sparty’s dismantling of…who in the world did they play again? Who cares? Sparty has the entire east region having a nervous breakdown.
• Unlucky 13s – None of the three 13 seeds managed a win today, putting the lucky 13’s streak of 6 consecutive years with a tournament win in serious jeopardy. The only remaining representative is Tulsa, and I do not like their chances against UCLA.
• Imperfect 10s – Likewise, not one of the three 10 seeds managed a win today, which is unusual because 10 seeds normally do fairly well against 7s. The 10’s last chance rests with Stanford as they face New Mexico tomorrow.
• Low 5s – On the other hand, of the three 12s that played today, two were winners over their 5 seed opponents, and the third (NC State) choked big time. The final 12-5 match up promises to be a thriller with VCU facing Stephen F. Austin. That’s a game to watch.

Day One Awards

It sure felt like every game was an upset today, but in point of fact, only four of the 16 games today were won by the lower seed. I say “only” as if 25% is a low number for upsets. There could have easily been three more. One can only hope that tomorrow’s games are half as exciting as today’s.

And now, without further pontificating, let us distribute a few Day One Awards.

• The Hey! You Got Your Peanut Butter In My Chocolate award goes to Tamara (Dunbar) Schoder, whose parenthesis confused my code and messed up the alphabetizing of the minions. I think she did it on purpose, but I can’t prove it.
• The You No Make-a The Game, You No Make-a The Rules award goes to Wayne Murray, who declared the contest over after finding himself in first place after just a few games. It’s not over until … well, it’s just not over yet!
• The Don’t Count Your Chickens award goes to Andrea Bauschek who celebrated her picking prowess after I tweeted that Dayton was beating Ohio State. “Wahoo! I picked one right!” she replied. Unfortunately she missed the part of the tweet where I said there were still 15 minutes left to play. Fortunately, Dayton won anyway.
• The Quote of the Day award goes to Bryson Davis who texted me this zinger right after San Diego State’s Xavier Thames fumbled the inbounds pass. “The bad inbounds pass was on the same level as the Chris Webber timeout on the stupidity meter.”
• The Plagues of Egypt award goes to Brad Schafer, who called me right after Ohio State’s stunning loss to announce that his bracket was toast, the cab of his dump truck was full of mice, and it was snowing. What’s next, frogs and locusts?
• The Biggest Loser award goes to Bekah Bruner who gave it the ol’ college try but managed only six wins for six points today. Cheer up, Bekah. Tomorrow is a new day.
• The Trifecta award goes to a collection of minions tied for third place with just one loss each: Braden Murray, Jordan Whine (Not to be confused with the aforementioned TJ Whine), Nathan Kimbrell, Bill Spyksma, Nick Nick Snider (is that like Bam Bam or JoJo?), and Jim “no I don’t draw Garfield” Davis.
• The Sophomore Slump award goes to last year’s contest champion David “Pick the Mascot” Ricks, currently tied for 135th. Perhaps this year he has picked the wrong mascot.
• The Sweet 16 award goes to contest front-runners James “Changed more poops than watched hoops” Badgley and “bblakerstyle” who each picked all sixteen games correctly today! James will receive a one month supply of Pampers, and bblakerstyle will receive a dartboard with Phil Jackson’s picture on it.

That’s it for today, minions. Time to recharge batteries and prepare for the next 16-game onslaught which begins less than 12 hours from now.

The Wizard of Whiteland

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