“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.” – Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

What In The Dickens Is Going On Around Here?

Today was a day Dickens surely would have appreciated. We saw the best of competitive games with pulse-pounding finishes, and we saw (if we could stay awake) the worst of games, the kind where you wished for the 10-run-rule to be magically implemented in basketball somehow to put the poor losers out of your misery.

• We should have known the Cardinal would win in St. Louis – The 10 seed Stanford Cardinal apparently got some mojo playing in the city whose baseball champions bear the same (or at least similar) name, upending the Kansas Jayhawks in yet another disappointing year for coach Self and his crew. Highly touted Kansas star Andrew Wiggins was a non-factor, and Kansas could not hit a desperation three on its final possession to tie and send the game into overtime. Kansas became the second #2 seed to exit the tournament early following Villanova’s loss to former Big East rival UConn yesterday.
• The return of the Fab 5 – The college basketball landscape has changed so much that a team starting five freshmen is not so much of a novelty as it was back in the Chris Webber, Jalen Rose days of Michigan’s early 90s Fab 5 squad. In what was easily the best game of the day, the undefeated Wichita State Shockers because the second team from the state of Kansas to go down in the space of about three hours this afternoon. No doubt the Wildcats had them seeing double, with identical twins Aaron and Andrew Harrison each scoring in double figures. (Does that qualify as a double double?) Wichita’s Cleanthony Early was never late, hitting big shot after unbelievably clutch big shot on his way to 31 points, but ultimately it was the Shockers, no longer the Cinderella, whose day ended in shockingly bitter defeat. Fred VanVleet, struggling all day with foul trouble, could not convert the three point buzzer beater to win, and the only team ever to start a season 35-0 has to go back to Wichita thinking about what might have been. For that I award them the New England Patriots Award For Near Perfection, which is of little consolation when the only game you lost was the last one.
• Holy Harvey Dent, Batman! The Mayor delivers again! – Does anyone besides me think Iowa State Cyclones coach Fred Hoiberg bears a striking resemblance to Aaron Eckhart, the actor? I report, you decide.

• In any case, the Cyclones won the third of today’s tantalizing close games, defeating North Carolina by two points in a game with one of the most bizarre endings you’ll ever see. Instead of a buzzer beater or a last second heave, this one was more like an Indy 500 with the first and second place cars wheel to wheel only to have a crash on the last lap and the race end under caution. After North Carolina’s James Michael McAdoo, a horrific free throw shooter by any measure, managed to calmly sink two free throws to tie with 16 seconds left, Iowa State’s DeAndre “Raising” Kane made an acrobatic, go-ahead layup with just two seconds remaining. In a sequence that only be described as chaotic, UNC inbounded the ball rather than calling time out, and then advanced it to half court where they finally called timeout at the pleadings of wildly gesticulating coach Roy Williams on the sidelines. What ensued was a lengthy consultation by the exasperated officials at the monitor trying to decide how much time, if any, should be left on the clock. Ultimately it was determined that while the clock didn’t stop soon enough when the timeout was called, it also didn’t start soon enough when the ball was inbounded. The zebras decided it was a wash and declared the game over. Give this one to Iowa State by TKO.
• And it was all down hill from there – The first three games of the day were decided by an average of 2.3 points. The final five games of the day were decided by a titanic average of 21.6 points! I am not making this up. Those final five were contests only a mother could love, and believe me, only the mothers were watching past about 8 minutes into any of these debacles.
• The proverbial broad side of the barn – The Memphis Tigers missed an astounding 35 shots, not including the 12 free throws they also missed! The 35 shots Memphis missed were the same number of shots Virginia made en route to their, uh, rout. Talk about paper tigers. This one was ugly.
• Doug McBuckets did not get his happy meal – The consensus player of the year was completely stymied, and the Creighton Bluejays were thumped by 30 – yes, 30 – by the Baylor Bears. This was the day’s third upset, but you wouldn’t know it by looking at the box score. It seems that maybe the seeds were backwards on these two.
• No mercy for Mercer – Tennessee started the game on a 7-0 run and only briefly looked back. The Volunteers are long and strong and fast and mean. They will be a tough out in Indy this weekend.
• No dismemberment, no foul – That apparently is the philosophy of long-time referee Teddy Valentine. To say they “let them play” in the Arizona-Gonzaga game would do a disservice to the cliché. Arizona literally ran away with this track meet, scoring 84 points and becoming the only team this season to beat the Zags by more than 10 points.
• It’s a family affair – In an interesting twist this year, Dayton Flyers head coach Archie Miller and Arizona Wildcats coach Sean Miller are brothers. While not necessarily likely, it is possible that we could have the Harbaugh-Bowl, part two, with these two teams playing one another for the national championship. The way this wacky tournament has gone, I wouldn’t rule it out.

Sweet 16 by the Numbers

Our field of 64 has been whittled down to 16, and here’s a quick look at the make up of this sweet collection.

• By Seeds: 3 #1s, 2 #2’s, 1 #3, 4 #4’s, 1 #6, 1 #7, 1 #8, 1 #10, and 2 #11s.  The fours are having a good year. The fives not so much. The Midwest regional in Indy is the most interesting with a 2, 4, 8, and 11. In the South regional, a 10 or 11 is guaranteed to play in the regional final, as they play each other in the regional semi-final. The West regional was the most conventional, advancing a 1, 2, 4, and 6.
• By Conferences: 3 SEC, 3 Big 10, 3 Pac 12, 2 Big 12, 2 AAC, 1 ACC, 1 Mountain West, and 1 Atlantic 10. The new and not-so-improved Big East is a no-show.
• By Mascots: You’ve heard of lions and tigers and bears, oh my! Well for us it’s rodents and reptiles and bears, oh my! That collection of creatures is 11-1 so far in the tournament. The Sweet 16 has 3 Military, 2 Bears, 2 Rodents, 2 Cats, a Reptile, a Botanical, a Natural Phenomenon, a Dog, an Ethnic Group, a Bird, and a Hillbilly. Apparently there’s no home on the range this year, as the range animals are all gone. Both the Clergy and the Demonic Powers went oh-fer this year, as did the Wild West Icons.

Random Musings

• The seven people Greg Anthony needs to meet – In today’s broadcast, commentator Greg Anthony quipped, “I want to meet the person who has that [Dayton vs Stanford] on their bracket.” Well then, there are seven people in our contest that Greg needs to meet: Paul Sopke, Brian Benson, Matthew Hand, Own Johnson, Gabriel Geistwhite, Sarah Gillig, and Gavin Hand.
• Len Elmore showed his age by quipping, “Sometimes a player gets too revved up, and he’s going at 78 revolutions per minute when he should be going 45 revolutions per minute.” Only people around my age and older even know what in the world he’s talking about.
• You know the guy in the Lowe’s commercial who hurls his ceiling fan out the front bay window? That’s how some of you treated your brackets today. In fact, some of you would hurl me out the front window were I standing in your living room.
• I love the AT&T commercials where the nerds make fun of the techno-idiots in such a way that they don’t realize they are being made fun of.
  •  Nerd #1 in the attack to Nerd #2: “That should do it.”
  • Woman’s voice heard from below: “What are you doing?”
  • Nerd #2, obviously smitten by woman: “We’re fine tuning these small cells that improve coverage, capacity, and quality of the network.” #Nerd 2 waits for woman to be impressed, but instead receives a blank stare.
  • Nerd #1 sticks his head down from the attic: “It means you’ll be able to post from the break room.”
  • Woman: “Great!”
  • Nerd #2: “Did it hurt…when you fell from heaven?”
  • Woman smiles coyly: “Kinda”
  • Nerd #2 blurts out classic nerd laugh, at which time the hand of nerd #1 reappears from the attic, jerking nerd #2 out of harm’s way. Classic.

Round Two Final Awards

And now for the final shout outs for round two.

• The You Get A Gold Start For Reading The Commentary award goes to alert contestant Jason Roehl who changed his alias to Lowland Gorilla this afternoon. Jason is currently in 148th place.
• The Flattery Will Get You Nowhere award goes to Bethany Davis, who changed her alias this afternoon to Joined the contest to read PJs commentary. (For the uninformed, I’m PJ, as in Pastor Jeff.) Bethany is currently T for 609th. Enjoy the commentary.
• The Just Say No award goes to 720th place contestant Doug Goodwin – “no rhyme; no reason; no points.” No kidding.
• The Jason Borne Award for Secret Identity goes to rule-breaking minion Jonathon “I know an Al ias” Doe. Whomever this actually is, the entry is in 100th place. Sadly, your standing will be vacated due to violation of Rule 7, Section 2, subsection a, part ii, which clearly states, “Enter your real name, doggone it!”
• The Sometimes You Feel Like A Nut award goes to Fred “The Blind Squirrel” Duncan, who apparently has found enough nuts to be in 24th place. Fred will receive a year’s supply of Almond Joy.
• The Even The Lone Ranger Needed Tanto Award For Best Sidekick goes to Ashlyn Little.  Asho, as we call her, is currently in 213th and provided today’s color commentary for the quick video analysis I posted early on the Facebook page.
• The Shot Down In A Blaze Of Glory award goes to Tyler Drone who dropped from a quasi-respectable 186th to 683rd. Tyler will receive a copy of the Young Guns soundtrack signed by Jon Bon Jovi.
• The Stumping For Votes award goes to Phil Stump who has risen from a lowly 685th to 128th. Phil Stump for mayor of March Madness!
• The I Think Maybe You Need To Go Back And Read Up On The Scoring System award goes to 599th place minion Caden “Derpy” Doll. Caden has picked 33 games correctly, which isn’t bad, except that not a one of them was an upset, hence the rank.
• The Top Prognosticator award for rounds 1 and 2 goes to Mike Gillig, currently in 54th. Mike has the best winning percentage among all contestants with a record of 40-8. His 8 losses include some big-point upsets, though, which is why he isn’t in the top 50.
• Finally, the Leader Of The Pack award goes to 1st place minion Genya “12th Man” Trisler. I am not sure if that’s 12th man as in “the fans at a football game” or 12th man as in “the poor sap on the end of the bench on a typically sized basketball roster.” In any case, Genya moved into first with Stanford’s win over Kansas and held that lead throughout the day.  Congratulations! Now let’s see if she can keep it through the end.

Re-Pick Round Has Begun

Let me just give a couple of words of advice and instructions regarding the re-pick round, which begins today.

Please, please, pretty please read the two sections of the website relating to the re-picks. The first is on the Rules & Scoring page toward the bottom, and it explains how re-picks are scored. The second, and more important, is the Enter Your Picks page, which explains HOW to make your re-picks.

Every year, someone emails me claiming that their score is wrong because the system is showing a game in red that they obviously picked correctly. These emails come to me because folks haven’t read the re-pick instructions. I promise, the system has your score right. It’s been in service for over a decade. There aren’t any bugs. You aren’t being cheated. Your bracket looks “weird” because it has been specially prepared for you to make your re-picks. It will return to normal on Thursday.

The re-picks exist to keep the contest interesting for people who might otherwise lose interest in the whole thing. You have until Thursday, 7:00 PM EDT to finish your re-picks.  If you have any questions about the scoring or instructions (after you’ve read them, of course), please feel free to email me.

And with that, I take a 3 day, 15 hour, 12 minute, and 15 second break.

The Wizard of Whiteland

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