Issue # 2.1.1 “Buffalo Roams, Pac 12 Moans” (3/15)

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DARK HORSE ‘ZONA OUT, TOP SEEDS STRUGGLE
In our 24th pool, we have 160 entries, our 3rd highest total

Loyola-Chicago near buzzer beaterCERRITOS, CA (smt)- With #1S-Virginia down a top player, it seemed like the journey was made for #4S-Arizona to play with a chip on its shoulder to the Final Four.  But Arizona is a Pac 12 team and with that curse, fell to#13S-Buffalo who won their first tourney game ever.  Just like that, the Pac 12 fizzled 0-3 and matched the horrible post-season showing of its football teams who went 1-8 in bowl games.  Buffalo’s win overshadowed #11S-Loyola-Chicago nailing a 3-pt near buzzer-beater (they put 0.3 sec back on clock) to advance to the Round of 32.  Top seeds had lots of trouble but eventually #4W-Gonzaga, #1MW-Kansas (#16MW-Penn led 21-11 at one point), #5W-Ohio St, #8MW-Seton Hall, #5S-Kentucky, #6W-Houston, #3E-Texas Tech (holding #14E-Stephen F Austin to no FGs in last 5 minutes), and #3W-Michigan were victorious.  #3S-Tennessee, #2MW-Duke, #1E-Villanova, and #6E-Florida had easy wins.  The tourney started with a riveting match that #7MW-Rhode Island pulled out in overtime over a #10MW-Oklahoma team that Trae Young that singlehandedly kept  them in the game.  The other mild upset was #9E-Alabama, despite 15 losses as an at-large pick, winning by 3 over #8E-Virginia Tech.

For our 24th pool, we unofficially have 160 entries from 112 people.  The is our third highest total (behind ’17‘s 178 and ’15‘s 161) and third-highest participation (behind ’17’s 124 and ’15’s 113).  We tied a record with 72 entries (’15) on Wednesday.  We also discovered that the comment section on our form doesn’t go anywhere and that ncaa<at>hwci.com has a very aggressive spam filter this year.  Growing pains.

Kds911SacKings4Ever, and M Star started off 13-0 but Buffalo fell them and they all ended tied for first with 30 pts (15-1).  Just 7 picked Buffalo (including West Coast Dreaming (4th-Tied, 28) who temporarily tied for first at 13-1), 55 picked Alabama, and an abnormally high 73 picked 11 seed Loyola-Chicago.  Scott T (The Fabone 2×4 (21st-T, 26)), who ended 2015 winning the last 4 Day 1 games then went 16-0 with his 2nd bracket in 2016 (The Resistance) and 16-0 with his 1st bracket in 2017 (Air Fabone) won the first 7 games today but Seton Hall ended his streak at 43.  In that streak he had correctly picked 10 straight upsets.  Suznana is last with 14 pts (7-9).  Thirteen (13) had Arizona as their champion and 31 had them in their Final Four.

[Twitter]We are now on Twitter (@HWCI_Pools).  Please follow!  I will post using #hwcincaa mini-updates during the day so you can follow without being on Twitter (and if you are, please use #hwcincaa).  Please join ourFacebook HWCI NCAA Pool Group or post comments on our blog.  Here you can join the group and meet your competitors, make new friends, set up NCAA watching gatherings, and post stuff to the wall (pictures, witty comments, etc.). 

   Tids & Bits – 12 started off 12-0 (none of these 12 players were the same as the 6 players who went 16-0 last year)… everyone picked Duke and Villanova… the most popular 16 seed pick was Penn (over Kansas) with one each picking W-Texas Southern and S-UMBC (both play Friday)… with my new Apple 4K TV, it was great watching the three games (one big box, two smaller ones; the CBS telecast is not available) on the NCAA March Madness App although I kept getting errors on the iPad (yes, for an Android is #1 and Apple is evil guy, I have 2 Apple products because they work really well — and Apple automatically converts your HD purchased movies to 4K, which if you have an OLED TV is mind-blowing at times)… Gonzaga has won 15 games in a row… how is it we have the #14MW-Buckell Bison and #15W-Lipscomb Bisons, but no Buffalo Bison(s) (they are the Bulls)?… we actually had someone submit three entries on our old CBS Sportsline website that we haven’t used in ages ;-)… First Four for Charity recap will come next week (oh yeah, I found six more entries due to the spam filter situation but that didn’t change our winner)… one crazy sequence was with the score tied at 70, #12W-South Dakota St fouled an Ohio St player on a 3 pt attempt and he made it and the free throw for a 4-point play; the next Ohio St possession once again SDSU fouled a 3-point attempt and Ohio St made all 3 free throws and suddenly it was 77-70 (ended 81-73)… SDSU and Ohio St tied a record with 71 3-point attempts with Ohio St taking 40 of them (making just 12)… the SEC went 4-0… for the first time ever, we have two entries that picked the exact same 63 games (they differ only in tiebreaker total points in final) — CryingJordans and AlfordBlows (21st-T) will forever be tied together… hardest thing was to choose a 3-letter abbreviation for San Diego St. U. and South Dakota St. U., both can’t be SDS, so opted for SDU (for San Diego St) and SDS (for South Dakota St)… 18 teams were picked to be champion, led by Villanova (42), Virginia (33), Duke (22), Michigan St (20), and Arizona (13)…

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The following takes place between 9 am Thursday and 9 am Friday.  Events occur in real time.

Won first 7, now back to my normal self … 
Scott


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