Issue # 7.3.1 “Once a Mid-Major, Always a Mid-Major” (3/24)

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ZAGS FALL AGAIN TO TEAM IN BETTER CONFERENCE
Mia Culpa leads by 9, nearly in money; 51 still alive

GOLETA, CA (smt) – Third time wasn’t the charm, as for the 3rd straight game #1W-Gonzaga struggled and their comeback was literally blocked as #4W-Arkansas made it back-to-back Elite 8s with a 74-68 win.  The Zags do well when not playing a team from the top conferences, as they lost to the SEC today, the Big 12 last year (Baylor) and ’19 (Texas Tech), the SEC again in ’18 (Florida St), and the ACC in ’15, ’16, and ’17 (Duke, Syracuse, and UNC).  Doesn’t matter if they are both #1 seeds or the Zags were the better seed, the Zags still behave like a mid-major team (like Butler before them) and fail to rise to the occasion.

Just as bad an omen, the West Coast teams again collapsed as #1S-Arizona also fell to a hot #5S-Houston team, 72-60.  Though Zona was still in it late, Houston still won their 3rd game in double-digits and also made their 2nd straight Elite 8.  Only #4E-UCLA remains from the West Coast in a year it seemed possible one of them would win the title for the first time since the ’97 Wildcats. 

Issue # 5.2.2 “Big Ten Implodes” (3/20)

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ARIZONA SURVIVES IN OT, 2 DOUBLE-DIGITS ADAVNCE
Mia Culpa goes 7-1 to take the lead and has best chance to win pool; 110 still alive

LAZY DOG, CERRITOS, CA (smt) – After #11S-Michigan won yesterday extending the Big Ten’s win streak to six, they could only watch as #4S-Illinois, #7S-Ohio St, #7W-Michigan St, and #3MW-Wisconsin fell in four consecutive games to start the day.  But #3E-Purdue salvaged the Big Ten day by going on an early 20-0 run and hitting 33 of 46 free throws to beat #6E-Texas.

Illinois had pulled within four (46-42) on a fast break dunk but RJ Melendez was called for a technical for hanging on a rim to protect himself.  #5S-Houston hit the free throw and went on a 19-7 run to blow the game open to make their third straight Sweet 16 (complete with shirtless coach).  Ohio St missed two front ends of a one-and-one and hit just 1 of 7 shots after rallying from 15 down to get it down to 2 as #2S-Villanova survived.  Michigan St went on a 13-2 run to go up by 5 late but #2W-Duke rallied back, going on a 15-4 run themselves and hit 7  free throws in the final minute to win by 9.  Playing near home in Milwaukee, Wisconsin was just 1 of 21 on threes at one point (before a meaningless three with seconds left) as #11MW-Iowa St went on a 9-0 run after the Badgers went up 28-27 and never looked back in reaching their first Sweet 16 since ’16.

Issue # 1.0.1 “Back to Normal?” (3/13)

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Sunday, March 13, 2022  **HELP support Ukrainian refugees via International Rescue Committee (deadline Tue 4:00 pm PDT **)

BLUE BLOODS BACK, ZAGS #1 OVERALL AGAIN
Our 27th pool is as normal as it gets – same fee, same rules, same heartbreak

NO SCHOOL MASK MANDATE AS OF MARCH 12, CA (smt) – After a year where we didn’t see any blue bloods in the top 8 seeds (with  Duke, Indiana, and Kentucky not even qualifying and only Kansas seeded 7 or better) with the likes of Illinois, Baylor, Houston, Alabama, and Iowa breaking through, this year the blue bloods are out for vengeance with #2W-Duke, #1MW-Kansas, and #2E-Kentucky among the favorites to win it all with #4E-UCLA, #8E-UNC, and #12bE-Indiana also joining the fun.  No longer confined to a single city and partial crowds, the NCAA returns to normal with full capacity crowds across 14 cities and optional masking (though testing before travel is still required).  Just one game (VCU had to forfeit against Oregon) was a no-contest and produced a first-time winner in Baylor.

#1W-Gonzaga repeated as the #1 overall seed (5th time as a 1 seed, third straight (would’ve been 4 if ’20 wasn’t cancelled)) with S-Arizona (who was ineligible last year due to a self-ban), Kansas, and E-Baylor also netting #1 seeds.  This was only the 2nd time two #1 seeds heralded from the Western USA (’00 with Zona and Stanford) and all four are not in the Eastern Time Zone (btw, Happy Daylight Savings).  The Big 12 got two #1 seeds for the first time since ’03 (OK and TX).  The three local teams were spread across regions with #7-USC in the Midwest and #15-Cal State Fullerton in the West.

Bubble team #11E-Virginia Tech not only played spoiler denying Coach K a 16th ACC title in his final year but also likely knocked Oklahoma to last out, by winning 13 of its last 15 games, including 4 in 4 days in the ACC tourney.  #12MW-Richmond’s upset of #10W-Davidson today knocked Dayton out of the tourney (who could have played on their home floor in the First Four).  But somehow #11S-Michigan not only snuck in but avoided the First Four.

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

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CERRITOS, 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.

Kds911, SacKings4Ever, and M Star started off 13-0 but Read the rest of this entry »

Issue # 7.3.1 “Blanked in the Final Minutes”

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Thursday, March 23, 2017 

CERRITOS APT (smt)- All four winning teams ended their games scoring the last few points in the final minutes.  #11W-Xavier stunned #2W-Arizona ending the game on a 9-0 run to win 73-71.  The Wildcats had a 7-point lead with 2:40 left and didn’t attempt one free throw while missing five shots and committing one turnover.  Arizona also had no timeouts and looked lost on their last few possessions.  The other Pac 12 team, #3MW-Oregon ended the game scoring the last four points in the last 1:48 to stop the incredible run of #7MW-Michigan, winning 69-68.  #1W-Gonzaga closed the game on a 6-0 run in the last 1:31 to hold off #4W-West Virginia, 61-58.  For some reason, WVU, with no timeouts, had 38 seconds, barely getting rim on two shots, grabbing both offensive rebounds, and then ran out the clock not getting a shot off as time expired.  This was a painful game to watch as WVU went on a slow 15-4 run in over 7 minutes with a ton of fouls called in between (WVU shot 27% and yet were still in the game because the Zags weren’t much better, missing a lot of free throws).  #1MW-Kansas also ended their game on a 5-0 in the last 2:11… difference was Kansas was already up by 27, routing #4MW-Purdue 98-66.  Purdue did have an 8-point first half lead at one point.

King Kobra maintained the 4-point lead (104) with Dboyz17, 9ers in ’18, Hrosen2, Thai Spice, SlumDawg, and EEChick1400 tied for 2nd at 100 points.  37 went 3-1 while six went 0-4.  BTW, who is King Kobra?  The Who’s Who has been up for a while on the homepage — see who is who.

19 lost Arizona as their champ and 71 more lost them in their Final Four. Bigtenfan2 (125th-T, 81) lost Purdue and Jackson’s Picks (101st-T, 84) lost WVU as their champ.

There are still 91 entries that can finish in the top 7 and 35 can still win the pool.  Russian Trolls (8th-Tied, 99) has the best chance to Read the rest of this entry »

A week away…

Well, next Thursday at 9 am PDT will be the deadline for entries in possibly, the last 65-team bracket.  Selection Sunday is four days away.  If Arizona doesn’t win the Pac-10 tournament, that will leave only Kansas as the lone team to be in every one of our brackets since we started in 1995.  We also may have as few as one newcomer to our bracket (Wofford) which would be the fewest since just four new (since 1995)  teams made it in 2007.  Let’s go Quinnipiac and Lehigh (which lost a play-in game in 2004 and thus didn’t make our bracket — see we treat the play-in game as not the REAL tournament)!

EDIT:  Damn, Quinnipiac.  Go Lehigh! Actually, if Wofford plays in the play-in game and loses, we could have no new teams!

USC Wins Pac-10 Title

Whoa… now I gotta pick them to make the 2nd round.  There’s one loss in my bracket already.  This is probably the final nail in Arizona’s coffin in extending their steak of 24 straight tourneys.  That gives the Pac 10 5 teams in the tourney, which is already one too many.  No room for ‘Zona to sneak in this time.  Barring some extreme generosity by the selection committee, Arizona and Kentucky failing to make the tourney will only leave Kansas as the lone team to be in every bracket since our pool started in 1995.