March 13, 2016: In the beginning, there was madness
Stat of the day
Kansas won their 10th Big 12 Tournament on Saturday. The rest of the Big 12 has won a combined total of 10 Big 12 Tournaments. That’s kinda good for Kansas and kinda not good for the rest of the Big 12.
Not to burst your bubble or anything but . . .
In college basketball, this time of year always brings crushing disappointment in the form of borderline NCAA Tournament teams falling just short in their final chances to impress the selection committee. Want to see where your team stands? Then check out our resident bracketologist
Joe Cook’s bracket from today (he’s just our friend and really, way too good for us) Joe ranks No. 2 nationally in bracket prediction accuracy over the last four years according to Bracket Matrix, which is light years ahead of the brackets you see on TV.
Heel yeah
If you haven’t had the chance to watch a Virginia basketball game this year, just imagine a guy punching a brick wall repeatedly for two hours. Usually the wall wins and we’re not sure what the point of trying was, but sometimes that wall falls and Virginia loses. Saturday night was one of those times as
North Carolina outlasted one of the nation’s top defensive teams in a good ol’ fashioned AFC North slugfest. The ACC regular season champ Tar Heels appear poised for one of the four No. 1 seeds after winning their first ACC Tournament title since 2008. Don’t be surprised if Virginia gets one, too, and don’t feel bad picking either of these teams to win it all -- or lose in the second round, because March!
Ducks fly together
Oregon isn't likely to get a No. 1 seed, and, unless you live on the West Coast, you're probably going to have a lot of friends who essentially ignore the Ducks in their bracket because they've never seen them play. But Oregon is good. Like, really good. The Ducks crushed a good Utah team 88-57 Saturday night in the Pac-12 title game, one day after knocking off Arizona. We're not saying you should pick the Ducks to win the title, we're just saying you should look a little deeper before dismissing them.
Whitehead does his best Black Beard
Seton Hall took down top-seed Villanova in the Big East Tournament final. Isaiah Whitehead led the way with 26 points and took home Most Outstanding Player honors. It’s the first Big East Tourney title for Seton Hall in 23 years and the Pirates will be dancing for the first time since 2006. The Pirates were a lock for the Tournament even without the win, and the bigger story of the night might come from their opponent. The loss puts major doubt into Villanova’s chances at a No. 1 seed, meaning you may have to find another 8 over 1 upset to pick. But on the bright side, now you have that 15 over 2 you were looking for.
“Thank God for basketball” - University of Kansas students, alumni, fans, donors….
Thanks to our stat of the day,
we already know Kansas won. What are our stat of the day also tells us is that this was the 20th version of the Big 12 Men’s Basketball tournament, and that Kansas has won half of them. This is somehow made less impressive if you recall back a couple of weeks when Kansas locked up their 12th straight regular season Big 12 championship. Yes, you read that correctly: 12 straight conference titles. I mean, winning half of the conference tournaments seems kind of cruddy when it’s compared to 12 league titles. The Jayhawks are a surefire lock for a No. 1 seed when the brackets come out and will look to make their second Final Four in the last five years.
Yeah, we major
Mid-majors
Stony Brook,
Weber State,
Buffalo,
Hampton,
Middle Tennessee State,
Fresno State,
Southern,
Hawaii,
CSU Bakersfield, and
Stephen F. Austin all punched their tickets to the Big Dance and will be looking to wreck your bracket next week, ensuring that your co-worker’s nine-year-old son will be winning the office pool once again. It’s really not fair . . . he doesn’t study the teams like you do. He just picks names he likes. Or at least keep telling yourself that.
Who's got next?
The final five automatic bids for the tournament will be punched tomorrow.
St. Joe’s vs VCU 12:30 EST on CBS
Kentucky vs Texas A&M 1:00 on ESPN
Louisiana Monroe vs Arkansas-Little Rock 1:00 on ESPN2
Michigan State vs Purdue 3:00 EST on CBS
Memphis vs UCONN 3:15 on ESPN
Selection Sunday
The NCAA Tournament bracket comes out later today. Here’s
how to watch. Bracket tip: The first thing you should do before filling out your bracket is crumble it up in a ball and shoot it into your trash can. That will be the most joy you get from that evil piece of paper.
Warriors won
Wash, rinse, repeat. The Warriors slept through three quarters then awoke in plenty of time to knock off Phoenix 123-116, pushing their record to 59-6, one game ahead of the 95-96 Bulls’ pace. That’s the good news. The bad news is Andre Iguodala is out for two weeks. That shouldn’t do much to hinder the Warriors’ title chances, but it could have Jordan and Pippen popping champagne (of course they won’t because they aren’t near as douchey or insecure as Mercury Morris).
Tweet of the Day
We’ve hidden something in a link today. You may have already found it. The clue: Damian Lillard
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