The Year Was 1995

1995. Before Javascript which helped run the online web entry from 1999-2013. Before finalfour.net debuted in 1996. Before DVDs. Before the Spice Girls. Before the Star Wars Special Editions. Our first pool was run by telephone by the HW-UCLA folks (including co-admin David (The Mighty Mobelfakta) and coercing unsuspecting victims like myself (Silver Fabone) to pony up $10 for a sport I didn’t watch. We got 12 entries that first year. And they assigned nicknames which was sometimes unflattering :-).

Congrats to Fullerton!

Well, with UCLA and USC doing well in the Pac 12 tournament, they should be in. But they will be joined by local Cal State Fullerton who beat the other local team, UC Irvine, in the Big West Tournament Final to make the tourney for the 3rd time and first time since 2008.  With the brackets coming out tomorrow, expect our website to be up very late Sunday or early Monday.  As usual, all the rules remain the same ($10/entry, max 3 entries, deadline 9 am PDT Thursday).  Spread the word to your friends and family and let’s see if we can top the 178 entries we got last year.  Feel free to follow us on Twitter or Facebook.

Issue # 8.3.2 “Ball’s Out & Buzzer Beater”

Archive

Friday, March 24, 2017 

CERRITOS APT/LONG BEACH, CA (smt)- Was just about to write all four teams winning by double-digits and then #4E-Florida decided to change things up.  Up by 12 with 4 and a half minutes left, #8E-Wisconsin battled back with some help from the Gators.  Florida missed four shots, two free throws, and committed two turnovers, and failed to foul while up by 3 leading to Zak Showalter’s off-balance running three-pointer to tie the game at 72 with 2 seconds left.  With our first overtime of the tourney, the momentum continued with the Badgers building a 5-point led with a minute left.  But it was the Badgers’ turn to help out, missing two free throws, committing a dumb early foul, Khalil Iverson mis-timing a breakaway dunk that was partially blocked, and inexplicably allowing Florida to run the down the court with four seconds to give Chris Chiozza an open look, albeit a stop-jump floater, buzzer-beating three-pointer to stun Wisconsin, 84-83.  Crazy.

#1S-North Carolina, #7E-South Carolina, and #2S-Kentucky easily won in double-digits.  In the latter, the most-annoying dad of Lonzo Ball must have been a distraction as #3S-UCLA’s Ball was held to 10 points and four turnovers while Kentucky freshman De’aaron Fox scored a tourney-record 39 points for a freshman.  In a touch of non-class, Ball actually declared for the NBA draft while in the locker room.

There is now a crazy five-way tie for first with King Kobra, Dboyz17, Hrosen2, Thai Spice, and SlumDawg at 108 points.  Alternative Picks (18th-Tied, 102), Biggie’s Back (12th-T, 103), ChasCroix1(78th-T, 92) and En Fuego (56th-T, 95) went 3-1 while 8 went 0-4.

16 lost UCLA as their champ and 27 more lost them in their Final Four.  Alley Loop (71st-T, 93) lost Read the rest of this entry »

Issue # 5.2.2 “Finish Strong”

Archive

Sunday, March 19, 2017 

LATE RALLIES AND HEART PROVIDE DRAMA
King Kobra remains in the lead by 4 points as 45 entries are eliminated

CERRITOS APT (smt)- No single play to discuss today (i.e., no dumb foul, no dumb flagrant-1, no dumb technical), just pure basketball drama.  #1S-UNC and #3MW-Oregon went on a doughnut run with the Tar Heels rallying from 5 down with 2:56 left to score the last 12 points and the Ducks rallying from 4 down with 2:01 left to score the last 7 points to knock off hopefuls #8S-Arkansas and #11MW-Rhode Island, respectively.

Other teams turned it on as well with #3S-UCLA down by one finishing the game on a 33-20 run in the last 13:32, #7MW-Michigan down by two finishing the game on a 24-18 run in the last 9:16, #1MW-Kansas up by one finishing the game on a 36-17 run in the last 12:00, #3E-Baylor down two finishing the game on a 17-11 run in the last 4:42 (a sequence that began with Manu Lecomte scoring 8 points in 45 seconds), and #8E-South Carolina down two finishing on a 42-33 run in the last 12:03. #2S-Kentucky narrowly won the ’14 rematch vs. #10S-Wichita St taking a tie game with 12:15 left and holding on to a three-point win thanks to two gutsy blocks on the final two Shocker possessions.  On the last one, it looked like the Wichita St. player could’ve leaned in to draw a foul on the three-point shot but didn’t.

Comeback kids #11E-USC never trailed by their magic number of 10 (just 9) and took the lead with under 5 minutes to go but couldn’t hold on against Baylor.  #11MW-Rhode Island played well but scored just 26 points in the second half allowing Oregon to rally.  Playing in their home state, South Carolina scored 65 points in the second half against #2E-Duke.

King Kobra increased the lead to four points (96) over Hrosen2 and EEChick1400.  Five went 7-1 for the day with only 9ers in’18 (7th-Tied, 88) getting at least five right the previous day.  Ten went 12-4 for the round.  On the flip side, Read the rest of this entry »

Issue # 9.3.2 “No 2nd Miracle for UCLA”

Archive

(Note: This is late — this after Friday’s games)

Friday, March 28, 2015

CERRITOS, CA/LA HABRA, CA (smt)- There was no repeat of the 2006 Bruin upset of the Zags as #2S-Gonzaga kept #11S-UCLA at bay, winning 74-62.  In the other three games, there were some challenges but legendary coaches coach well, as Rick Pitino’s #4E-Louiville stopped #8E-NC State, 75-65, Coach K’s #1S-Duke outlasted #5S-Utah, 63-57, and Tom Izzo’s #7E-Michigan St made key plays to knock off #3E-Oklahoma, 62-58.

Will I Ever Win This was one of 5 to go 4-0 today and one of three to go perfect in the Sweet 16 to take the lead (117 pts).  Big Luther (2nd, 117) and BobbyCee’sRacer’sEdge (4th-Tied, 114) also went 8-0 in the round.  Only 6 other times Read the rest of this entry »

Local Representation

Southern California will have 3 teams in the tourney, though none will be the University of Southern California, who despite the hot coach with the hot wife, finished last in the Pac 12.  But their rival, UCLA, will be in the tourney after beating #4 Arizona for the conference championship.  The Pac 12 won’t get any respect though, so don’t expect UCLA to be ranked too high.

And in the biggest surprise of the conference championships, Cal Poly San Luis Obsipo (SLO) began the tourney 10-19 and proceeded to rout #2 Santa Barbara,  upset #1 UC Irvine (my wife’s alma mater who was also trying to make the NCAA tourney for the 1st time ever), and outlast Cal State Northridge in the Big West final.  Their first-ever appearance in the NCAA tourney, they are a shoo in for the First Four, so they probably won’t make the proper 64.

Finally, despite losing in the Mountain West final, San Diego St. will be in the tourney.  So three local teams aren’t bad.  But I am not picking Cal Poly SLO if they somehow did make it the proper 64!

Poor Anteaters

Well, UC-Irvine had a chance to make the tourney for the first time but came out short (literally on their late 3-pt attempts).  And the big UC, UCLA lost in the Pac 12 Championship.  San Diego St. may be the only other SoCal team with a chance to make the tourney.  Brackets start to come out at 3 pm PDT (you can add this to your calendar).  We hope to get the online entry done by Monday morning, though in the past we’ve snuck it in before midnight Sunday.  Check often.  Please follow us (@HWCI_Pools) and use #hwcincaa for any tweets and for the latest quick (intra-day) updates.  The initial email has been sent out so if you didn’t get one, please let us know.  Everything is the same as before – $10/entry (up to 3 entries) with a Thursday 9 a.m. PDT deadline.

Will third time be the charm?

UCLA is holding tough, tied with Florida at 39.  Florida bounced UCLA out of the final and semifinal in back-to-back years so will this third matchup go UCLA’s way?

Local Represenation

Long Beach St. (despite winning the Big West regular season title easily) may have been knocked out the tournament with its loss in the Big West final, but UC-Santa Barbara will replace them.  In addition to UCSB, UCLA as expected made the tournament but also USC, who will play in the first-ever First Four first round (it’s not a play-in!).  If we go further south, UC-San Diego San Diego St. got a #2 seed in the West giving the Southern California area four teams.

Planning to get the initial email out later tonight and hopefully we’ll get the bracket up Monday morning.

Tyus Edney Saved Our Pool

15 years ago today (March 19th), Tyus Edney went coast-to-coast in 4.8 seconds to help UCLA beat Mizzou and possibly saved the HWCI NCAA Pool.  This pool was created because UCLA was the favorite to win it all by our UCLA alumni in a Westwood apartment.  Of course, UCLA went on to win it all and the pool has continued ever since.  But had UCLA lost, who knows, we may have deleted all files and closed down shop.

Here is the recap, then done by Andy way back in 1995, the first year of our pool.

West coast bias?

Where are all the west coast teams, especially the southwest? Maybe San Diego St. Maybe Arizona St. Maybe Santa Barbara. Maybe UNLV. St. Mary’s, Oakland, and Cal are in but they’re in northern California. For the first time since 2004, no USC or UCLA. How will that affect the number entries in our pool with no local team in it?

Edit: This Oakland’s in Michigan…

96!

As of 2 am this morning, we unofficially have 96 entries, just 5 short of our record!  We are trying to match to the person RUBBER BISCUT, PRIDE OF TROY!, and BABY OIUJA (though we have a pretty good idea who these are, just need to confirm).  Gareth M even funded putting President Obama’s picks into this pool (PRESIDENTIAL PICKS).  Hopefully that bracket will bring him more money than the stimulus plan that was passed.  And still no love for UCLA (just one has them in the Elite 8).

How bad was UCLA’s pod in Philly?  They’ll travel around 2,720 miles while their opponent VCU will travel around 245 miles.  If UCLA wins, their two possible opponents will travel either 19 miles (Villanova) or 141 miles (American U.).

#1’s Still Top Choice

For the 43 entries received thus far, the top three teams picked to win it all are all #1 seeds and the 4th team is Memphis, which should’ve been a #1 seed.  UNC leads with 14 followed by fellow 1’s Louisville (8) and Pitt (7).  Memphis (5) edges out Oklahoma (4) with the remaining #1 seed UConn being picked by just 2.  Three others have a vote each.  11 teams haven’t been picked by anyone to win their first game.  Not much love for UCLA or USC (neither being picked past the Sweet 16) and Northridge is still looking for that one person to pick them to beat Memphis. 😉

Only when it counts…

I see UCLA is following Pitt and UConn’s lead in losing early in the conference tourney in order to be rested for the REAL tournament.  Unfortunately, it was to rival USC.  Now, USC is just a win away from the tournament (and still has a slim shot even if they lose in the conference final to ASU).  Yes, this pool will be very unpredictable.  And Syracuse only needed ONE overtime tonight, and has played 115 minutes of bball in two days.