Once you become predictable, no one’s interested anymore. – Chet Atkins

A Tale of Two Tournaments

The two opening days of March Madness could scarcely have been more different.  The historically thrilling nature of yesterday has been well rehearsed both in my commentary and elsewhere.  While I am not necessarily claiming that today’s contests were without their thrilling moments, I do believe that the day belonged more to normalcy than madness.  Consider the following:

• Yesterday five games were decided by a single point, and three more came down to the last possession.  Today only two games came down to the last possession, and none of the rest were closer than six points.
• Yesterday began with four of the first eight games being won by the lower seed.  From that point onward, the next 23 consecutive games were won by the favorite.  Were it not for Dayton’s lone upset of higher-seeded Providence, history would have been made today with all 16 games being won by the higher seed.
• Yesterday only four games managed at least 70 points in regulation by one or both teams.  Today there were only four games where neither team managed at least 70 points, and four teams managed at least 80 in their victories.

I guess FiveThirtyEight was right after all.  This year’s bracket IS top heavy.  It just took half a day for that fact to materialize.

More Madness By The Numbers

• California Isn’t The Only Place Dealing With Drought – Providence hasn’t won a tournament game since 1997.  Before their big win over Davidson today, Iowa hadn’t won a tournament game since 2001.
• Crazy 8’s – It’s not just a card game you played as a kid.  This year all four 8 seeds were victorious, a feat accomplished only two other times in the 64-team era: 2000 and 2002.  In fact, the 8s weren’t the only seed to find perfection this year.  The 1s, 2s, 4s, and 5s were also 4-0, further lending credence to the top-heavy analysis of this year’s bracket.
• Double-Digit Dilemma – If you’ve done the math, you’ll know that only five double-digit seeds remain, the ones that provided the tournament’s only five upsets.  At least one is guaranteed a trip to the Sweet 16, as #11 UCLA and #14 UAB play one another.  This bodes well for a few minions who stand to earn a Scategories bonus if UAB happens to be that team.
• The final game between Dayton and Providence began with 3 made field goals, 12 turnovers, and 11 total points (for BOTH teams combined) in the first 8:00 minutes.  The Friars took 59 shots in this game – 26 of them from behind the arc – and made just 20 for 34%.  A whopping 26 of those shots were taken by a single player, LaDontae Henton, who made only 7 of them for 27% shooting.
• Make Free Throws, Win Games – Maryland closed out its win over Valpo by making 8 consecutive free throws.
• Conference Watch – The ACC, MVC, and Pac 12 are perfect so far. The B1G is 5-2, the Big East is 4-2, and the Big 12 is 3-4.

Uniforms, Mascots, Funny Names, and Other Miscellany

• The Battle of the Highlighters was won by the yellow team who ground out a six-point victory over the orange team.

• The Meanest Mascot of the Day award goes to the Albany Great Dane who was an imposing fellow, indeed.
• The Most Awkward Mascot of the Day award goes to the UC-Irvine Anteater who had as much trouble controlling his own lengthy snout as 7’6″ center Mamadou Ndiaye had controlling his own arms.
• The Most Sensitive Mascot of the Day award goes to the Wichita State Shocker who did not take kindly to being Twitter-bullied by Chris Webber and told him so.  Well, I guess the Shocker sort of mimed him so, since mascots can’t talk and all that.  Why is that, by the way?  Is that part of some unwritten mascot code, or is it written in the bylaws of the American Mascots union?
• What Did He Say? – I promise the first few times I heard Davidson’s Tyler Kalinoski’s name called, I thought the game announcer was saying colonoscopy, which I might have, in fact, preferred getting over having to watch that debacle.
• Scootchie kutche coo! – Dayton. Scootchie Smith. I don’t know what else to say.
• Home Court Advantage – Gonzaga played its game in Seattle just 230 miles from their campus in Spokane.  This is not surprising given that Gonzaga earned a 2 seed.  On the other hand, riddle me this, Batman.  How is it that Dayton, supposedly the last team in the field of 68 (I still cringe every time I have to say that), gets to play-in to an 11 seed on its home court in Dayton AND THEN is rewarded by being sent only 72 miles down the road to Columbus for its round of 64 game?  Providence, the higher seed, essentially played a road game in an arena filled with fans for the opposing team.  While the First Four being played in Dayton is understandable, the committee’s placement of the Dayton/Boise State winner in Columbus is not.
• Insult To Injury – And as if the aforementioned home court advantage wasn’t enough, the rhyme-time showdown of Flyers vs. Friars didn’t tip until 10:52 PM local time!  So I’m the Friars, the higher seed, and I have to play a team 72 miles from its home city at 11 PM on a Friday night?  That definitely gets the You Gotta Be Kidding Me award.
• And while we’re stuck on Providence getting the shaft, the Bobby Knight Award For Superior Chair Throwing goes to Providence coach Ed Cooley for slamming a folding chair on the floor during a timeout.  He was rewarded with a technical foul from the officials, who apparently didn’t appreciate his tantrum, even though they shouldn’t have even been anywhere near him at the time in the first place.  He was having a conversation with his team in the huddle during a timeout, and in an attempt to fire up his players, was Teed up by the ref for lack of decorum, I suppose.  Honestly I think the refs were cranky because it was way past their bedtime.
• Quotable Quotes – I must say, Doug Gottlieb is growing on me.  He had a couple of quips today that made me chuckle.
  • “Who plans a wedding the first weekend of March Madness?  I mean, that’s just un-American!”  Apparently some critical member of the Dayton coaching staff has a wedding to go to on Saturday.
  • “It was such a ridiculous call that nobody knew who the foul was on.”  This was a completely accurate statement.  At one point in the now way over-discussed Flyers v Friars affair, the refs blew the whistle, but no one moved, because not one of the 10 players on the floor had any clue what was being called or who it was on.  Again, I chalk this up to sleep depravation for both officials and players.
• Even Cinderella Has To Be Home By Midnight – Dayton seems to be a trendy pick (again) for this year’s Cinderella, but if this were an actual fairy tale, every player would have been replaced by pumpkins by halftime.  I mean, seriously, who schedules a game to BEGIN at 11 PM local time?  Bobby Knight used to complain about tournament games tipping at 10 PM, but this is beyond the pale.  Don’t these people know I have a commentary to write?
• Sometimes You Eat the Bear, And Sometimes The Bear Eats You – No, actually, you always just get eaten by the bear.  “Bring on Duke,” Robert Morris University tweeted.  Yeah, man, we’ll take a piece of them!  “Very well,” coach K calmly replies.  “A piece you shall have.”  RMU gets coach-K-O’d by 29 points, and the work-study kid in charge of RMU’s Twitter account has his password revoked.

Media Madness

If you watch 48 consecutive hours of televised sports like I just did, the commercials definitely become part of the experience.  Here’s a few awards for the hard working folks at the marketing firms that come up with those ads that, for reasons both good and bad, we can’t seem to forget.

• The Best Village Idiot award goes to Capital One’s spots featuring the self-deprecating and always entertaining Charles Barkley.  Barkley is the best foil to appear in commercials since the dorky dude who played PC in the Mac v PC commercials.  If you haven’t seen the “In The Annapolis” spot with Samuel L. Jackson and Spike Lee, you don’t know what you’re missing.  Check it out here: http://creativity-online.com/work/capital-one-road-to-the-final-four–annapolis/39931.  Other great quips from Barkley in these ads include “I wish pandas were real” and “I wish every truck was a taco truck.”
• The Best Use Of Office Pools In Advertising award goes to Buffalo Wild WIngs for their spot where dude #1 is sifting through his stack of brackets, and his pal criticizes him for it.  “It cheapens the bracket,” he says.
• The Best Connection With The March Madness Fan award goes to Arby’s, of all companies.  Arby’s managed to connect roast beef sandwiches with March Madness by deftly exploiting the madness itself.  In one spot the announcer says, “Your brackets are in.  There is nothing you can do to change them.  The only thing you can do now is yell at the television.  The louder you yell, the more you influence the outcome.”  In another spot he plays on the superstitious nature of fans by proclaiming, “If you ate this sandwich yesterday, and your team won, you need to eat it again when they play tomorrow!”
• The Most Ironic Use Of Irony award goes to AT&T for their ad featuring Dr. J, Shaq, and Christian Laettner.  Laettner offers the words of wisdom, “You can’t just make it to the Sweet 16 and then sit back and rest on your laurels.”  When Dr. J asks if he sees the irony in that statement, Laettner quips, “Yes, I do.  I literally made this hammock out of my laurels so that I could rest on them.”  He then goes on to describe all of the basketball nets he cut down that now comprised his comfy hammock.
• The Nostalgia award goes to Coca Cola for bringing back that 80’s classic 99 Red Balloons.  You children of the 80’s will surely remember that song.  It was the one that had the English version on side of the 45 and the German version on the other.
• The I Assume You Did That On Purpose award goes to the makers of the Divergent film series.  I noted from last year’s contest commentary that the first Divergent film opened on the first Friday of March Madness.  Apparently that was a success, because the sequel, Insurgent, opened today, again on the first Friday of March Madness.  Next year I assume we can expect the third film in the series, Detergent, to open on the first Friday,  In Detergent, our heroin, Tris, reverts to her Abnegation roots and just starts cleaning up after everyone.
• And last, and certainly least, the So Dumb It’s Almost Funny award goes to the Lowe’s add where the suddenly handyman husband feels so empowered by the DIY training he received at Lowes and the praise of his wife, he decides to share his great new product idea with the boss at work: the glow-in-the-dark cat hat.  Never lose your cat in the dark again.  A large dog might be just as effective.

Round One Awards

Alright, enough of this foolishness, minions.  It’s time for the round one awards brought to you by Keurig, maker of the world’s best coffee machine and the only thing in this house keeping me awake enough to finish this commentary.

• The Upset Stomach award brought to you by Prilosec OTC goes to the six contestants who picked all five upsets correctly: Jane Gomez (T1), Kip Layman (T18), Colt Stratton (T1), Isaiah Geistwhite (35), Dave Barndt (T18) , and Daniel Labbato (78).  It should be noted that Daniel guaranteed himself all upsets by picking nothing BUT upsets for all 32 games.  As you can see, this is not a winning strategy, as he is now 5-27 and can win at most 2 games in the next round.
• The Playing It Safe award goes to the two minions who made the “weenie picks,” i.e., they picked the higher seed to win every game in the round of 64: Maggie Booher and Ron Walker.  The good news is that they are both 27-5, which is excellent.  The bad news is this strategy got them only 27 points, because non-upsets are worth only one point each in the first round.  27 points is good enough for a tie for 437th.
• The Top Prognosticator award for round one goes to the minion who picked the most games correctly in the round of 64, Bryce Boyer, who went an impressive 29-3.  Nevertheless, this performance is only good enough for 47th in the standings.  Honorable Mention for this award goes to Brandon Lane, Jim Richards, Tom Marshall, Sandra Jones, and Zach Miller each with 28 correct picks.
• The I’m Still Standing award goes to Keith Fisher, Rita Dieringer, Connor Gillig, Beth Wynn, and Chad Wright.  Each of these contestants has made it to the round of 32 without losing a single Sweet 16 team yet.
• The Biggest Loser award goes to Richard Goodwin, who dropped from 143 all the way to 555 over the course of the day.
• The Rising Star award goes to KJ Afterkirk who climbed nearly 400 spots from 647 to 257 over the same time span.
• The Picking Like It’s 1999 award goes to Garrison “I was dreaming when I wrote this” Cooper, currently tied for 7th with 51 points.  Honorable mention goes to the others tied for 7th, Aiden “the kid” Pryor and Keith Fisher.
• The Middling Award For Mediocrity goes to Becky Thornton who almost exactly in the median position at 378th.
• The iPick Poorly award goes to the minion whose alias is the mathematical concept square root of -1, also referred to in complex number studies as simply i, the imaginary number – just as imaginary as his picks.  He has 18 points and is tied for 746th, nearly (but not quite) dead last.  Name withheld to protect the guilty.
• The Heinz 57 award goes to Jordyn Glassley and Erica “VegasBabby” Vatne for being tied for 57th, of course.  You two have some ketching up to do.
• Finally, the Yellow Jersey award goes to the leaders after stage one, Jane “This one looks as good as any” Gomez and Colt “Coltron” Stratton.  Like the games from day one and day two, these two are opposite ends of the spectrum.  Jane is a female 60 and over, and Colt is a boy 12 and under.  This just goes to show that Jeff’s March Madness Contest is anyone’s game to win.

Ok, minions, I have pontificated to the point of exhaustion, yours and mine.  The round of 32 tips off in just over 7 hours.  It’s time for the Wizard to regroup and recup.  Until then, may your brackets not be busted.

The Wizard of Whiteland

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