Syracuse getting in is a joke. Does Jim have somebody's nudes on his phone or what? Guys avoided being fired for a Penn State level scandal involving an assistant coach and consistently squeaks into the tourney when his team underperformed. Incredible.

Side note idk if I'd say SLU got screwed. They were outside looking in for me going into the final week.

If you have any interest in seeing how your favorite bracketologist did, check out bracketmatrix.com.  Looks like there are roughly 200 entities who put out predicted brackets in some form.  Scoring is the sum of teams correctly picked, seeds correctly picked, and teams seeded correctly +/-1 slot.  Not a bad way to measure.  Patrick Stevens of The WP edged out Warren Nolan as the top forecaster this season.  For those of you who hang onto every Joe Lunardi pick for dear life, Joey finished in 84th place.

 

The Dude wrote:

Question, you are a 6 seed, would you rather have the known 11 seed game, or play the winner of the 11 vs 11 play in game?

Seems to me that the 11 vs 11 seed winners have done pretty well (including a few A10 teams over the years) does playing a team that got its sea legs, shook off any jitters, scored a tourney win, work against some 6 seed teams?

Depends on matchups, but generally I’d rather have the 5 days to prepare.  (That said, if Juzang is out for UCLA, because he got hurt last night, that might make them a better matchup for BYU than other 11s).

Despite being the 2 seed, Ohio State couldn't defend, they missed a lot of free throws and took terrible shots in the final minutes and overtime. OSU was missing a key player today in Kyle Young and lost. I think Michigan and Villanova(I don't see how either team can make a deep run without Livers and Gillespie) will get upset in the 2nd round due to key players being out. Tennessee is also without a starter and Oregon State is crushing them right now.

If Loyola Chicago can hold on and beat Georgia Tech, I'm interested to see how they fare against Illinois, this matchup would be another instance of a BCS "big brother" ducking the local "little brother" as Illinois refused to play Loyola Chicago. Remember a few years ago we had Wichita State upset/beat up Kansas in the 2nd round of the tournament

I will personally be very happy if the Aztecs make a deep run.  Say to the Elite 8.

America's greatest forecaster, Joe Lunardi, nails the biggest upset in years

"LUNARDI NAILS UPSET PREDICTION WITH ORAL ROBERTS OVER OHIO STATE"
 

Well done? =)

Say what you will about Syracuse gift invites, Boeheim pulls off seed upsets year after year with these bubble teams. 

Even though Syracuse crushed San Diego State, I don't think they belonged in the NCAA tournament. It's stunning how Syracuse can have an average team, yet in the NCAA tournament their 2-3 zone keeps making teams look as if they've never played organized basketball before. San Diego State did not score a point during the final 9 minutes of the 1st half, they took terrible 3-point shots and couldn't make basic passes until the final minutes when Syracuse "called off the dogs"!! These Syracuse NCAA tournament runs remind me of John Chaney's Temple teams that would get a 10 or 11 seed then have multiple BCS teams have their worst offensive performances in school history!!

A similar fate probably happened to North Carolina last night against Wisconsin as UNC also looked disoriented on offense for the entire game. North Carolina actually had a huge size advantage and were unable to take advantage of it until they were down by about 25 midway through the 2nd half!! Roy Williams had been 29-0 in the 1st round of the NCAA tournament until last night. 

Great win for GW's 2005 trio(LOL) last night, in typical fashion Rutgers won a hard-nosed, grind-it-out type of game over Clemson. I don't think Rutgers has much of a chance against Houston tomorrow, but Pikiell is making history at Rutgers(I believe they showed it was their first NCAA tournament win since 1983!!) and it was good to see the excitement of the Rutgers family members/fans in the stands after they won.

A lot of "Games of Interest" today as Georgetown plays early, St. Bonaventure plays next, the Maryland, then VCU plays the late game. The only game I'm pretty sure about is UConn beating Maryland. I think UConn is a bad matchup for Maryland because of UConn's strong guard play and their athleticism, I don't see how Maryland will be able to slow them down. 

This first half of the Colorado-Georgetown game reminds me of GW-Vandy.

Team that had an underwhelming regular season gets hot and wins conference tourney and gets over seeded when they are not as good as some/many of the 13 and 14 seeds.  Decent, but overlooked BCS opponent can’t miss in the first half; total blowout.

Bonnies controlling tempo and playing great defense but they can’t make a shot.  They are getting good shots but are like 3-20 from the field. Need to maie some shots.