Just for those who want to skip to the end of the book and read the last page.   Or simply for those who want to figure out what teams they should root for (or if you believe you have a power similar to the Lunatic Curse, who you want to try to destroy).

The 8 scenario files are up that should tell you how you will do based on the final potential outcomes.   At this point, I am relatively sleep deprived – and so, realize that these are as always, unofficial – all that matters is what is in the final standings page.

Good luck to everyone!!!!!!

At this critical stage in the tournament, congratulations go out to Mike Wassmer – who leads our pool with 960 points.  Mike correctly picked Villanova, Oklahoma, and UNC to the Final Four to take a 30 point lead over Tanmay Gautam (who also had those three teams in the Final 4).   Then, Nathan Standley, Andrew Braslow, Audra Lifson, Jim Carini and Ann Hawkins trail our leader by 60 – with a total of 900, and David Chamowitz and Michael Swinson are behind by only 70.

In our Upset Pool, John Bachmann hangs onto the lead at 275 points.  But Gregg Farber has shot up into 2nd place just 2 points behind our leader as Gregg was the only person brave enough to pick Syracuse to the Final Four.  Kelli Shonts is in 3rd, just 6 points behind, Doug Crowe is in 4th just 7 points behind, and Rick Flynn is in 5th just 8 points behind.   So, we have a really tight leader-board in the Upset Pool (although, there might not be a lot more movement as since Gregg didn’t pick the Orange to the Championship game, the only teams that can score people points are 1 and 2 seeds).

Andrew Murphy holds the lead in the Second Chance Pool – leading with 520 points.  Just 40 points behind are Pam Ciejek, Ann Hawkins, Mary-Rian Bradley, Jim Wambach, Matt Shafiee, Dan Miller, Will Caldwell, Jerry Caldwell, John Bachmann, Kristian Schmidt, Nick Kindig and Lowell Isaacs.   So, the Second Chance Pool looks like it will be extremely close…….

Congratulations to Mary-Rian Bradley, because not only is she doing great in the Second Chance Pool, but she also has the traditional first prize awarded in the Lunatic Pool.   At 240 points and after picking Kentucky, Arizona, Northern Iowa and Fresno State, Mary-Rian’s picks have guaranteed the last place of the paid entries into the Standard Pool, and gets her entry fee back.   Considering the Lunatic’s poor second week performance, he does not deserve any recognition.   Mary-Rian should not have challenged our leader Mike.

 

 

The run was coming.  The Tar Heels had watched their lead fall from 11-3.  And Brice Johnson had just turned an over-the-back violation into a technical foul as he tossed the ball over his head in disgust, and the Irish hit the technical FTs and a layup on the next drive to finish a 12-0 run to take the lead.  And the Lunatic thought – here it comes.  Then something amazing happened.

Marcus Paige made a nice shot to get back the lead, and then what might have been the pivotal play of the game.  UNC’s Theo Pinson stole the ball from Bonzie Colson at the top of the key, and fell on the ball to call time-out and get the possession.   And with the Tar Heels now going small, the momentum changed again, the Tar Heels scored the next 10 points to finish their own 12-0 run and get back their 11 point lead.   And then, the Tar Heels never looked back – partially thanks to beating the Irish to almost every rebound.

Congratulations to North Carolina for a fantastic victory to earn a trip to the Final Four.   And so our four contestants in Houston are set.   Big East regular season champion Villanova will take on Oklahoma and their superstar, Buddy Hield.   And the ACC champion North Carolina will take on a Syracuse team, who has taken the gift given to them by the Selection Committee as one of the worst RPI teams in history to get an at-large bid and has played as champions.

Three of the four teams remaining have held weeks at #1 in the polls throughout the season.  And Syracuse certainly won’t be intimidated by any of them – with their hall of fame coach leading them.   Good luck to the Wildcats, Sooners, Tar Heels and Orange!!!!   It should be a fantastic Final Four worthy of what has been a fantastic tournament.

The Virginia Cavaliers looked like everything was going right for them.  The team that had knocked them off the last two tournaments was upset in the first round.   The other top 10 school that was only 1 1/2 hours away from the Chicago regional semi-finals/finals also got upset in the first round.   And the top seeded Cavaliers had beaten Butler and Iowa State to get to the final, where they would face a team they beat earlier in the season to get to the Final Four.

Then, they jumped out to a 14 point lead on the Syracuse Orange – which they then held onto going into the last final 10 minutes.  They had cut the lead to 9 points at the 8 minute TV timeout, as Charlie and I watched on my computer so Katie could watch Henry Danger on TV.    I thought to myself that I would take the break to use the bathroom and watch the last 5 minutes before taking the kids to bed.   And when I came back into the room, Charlie says, “Guess what, Dad?   Syracuse is winning!”  Sure enough, as I get back to my computer, I see that while I was gone, the Orange had gone on a 12-2 run to take a 59-58 lead (apparently led by some great play by Malachi Richardson).   My wife looks up in surprise and says we should put it on the big TV, much to Katie’s chagrin.  And we all watched as Syracuse continued stopping Virginia every single time down the court to finish up with an amazing 68-62 victory.

I was actually glad it was time to take the kids up to bed, because I had no clue of what to write in the blog.  As many know, Syracuse is not one of my favorite teams.   I very loudly screamed that Syracuse shouldn’t be in the tournament with all their losses in the ACC.   And yet, hear the Orange are, cutting down the nets in Chicago and getting ready to the Final Four.    They definitely proved me wrong – they proved everyone wrong (tell me how many people outside of Syracuse fans picked the Orange to get this far).  But in this crazy tournament, this of course make sense.   Here we had one of the top teams in the country with a 14 point lead with under 10 minutes to play against a double digit seed.  And so of course, the double digit seed would go on to outscore the #1 seed 31-11 for the remainder of the game.   No lead has been safe in this tournament, and painfully, for the Virginia Cavaliers, heartache would hit them this Easter Sunday, as they went unbelievably cold at one of the most important moments of its season.

So, now, after all 4 #1 seeds made it to the Elite 8, we have only one remaining.   And I feel bad for them.   That is because, the North Carolina Tar Heels now enter this game as the favorite to win the tournament.  And this tournament has not been kind to favorites.   The Lunatic Curse has been in rare form this week, as I have watched in pain as I have gone from in the lead to tied for 200th as Miami FL, Texas A&M, Duke, Oregon and Kansas all have lost.   And so the only remaining team that can score points for the Lunatic is of course – the North Carolina Tar Heels.  And if that isn’t bad enough, their opponent is the Notre Dame Fighting Irish – a team they lost to on the road in the regular season (before destroying them in the ACC tournament).   All the Irish have done is come back from being down 12 at half against Michigan, come back from being 5 down with 1 1/2 minutes left to get a last second tip-in basket by a player who typically averages 2 points per game to beat Stephen F Austin, and then stole the ball twice in the last 28 seconds after being down 3 to come back and beat the Badgers.

So, all the Tar Heels have riding against them is the Lunatic Curse, the pressure of being the last remaining #1 seed, the pressure of beating a team that they are expected to beat convincingly because of what they did in the ACC tournament, and of course that opponent is the Fighting Irish – one of the teams that the Lunatic is not allowed to root for on pure principle of being a Boilermaker.  That same Fighting Irish team that has needed to comeback in amazing fashion in all three games to just get the chance to play the Tar Heels.   And the Tar Heels will take a 5 point lead into the second half – which means the stage is now completely set for what the Lunatic has watched all weekend.   Notre Dame has the #1 seed right where they want them – and so I feel bad for North Carolina – I hope my curse doesn’t knock them out as well as everyone else I have rooted for this weekend (especially when they were nice enough to take out the Hoosiers).   Good luck, Tar Heels.  With everything against you, you will need it.

There wasn’t much to write about the first game.   Buddy Hield scored 37 points to lead the Sooners over the Ducks to be our first team to make their way to the Final Four.

In the later game, senior Ryan Arcidiacono hit some critical FTs near the end, and knocked the ball out of Frank Mason III’s hands to get one of the best birthday gifts ever – a trip to the Final Four!

And so the #1 team going into the tournament, the Kansas Jayhawks, have been eliminated from the tournament.   And thus, Villanova and Oklahoma await to see which two ACC teams will join them in the Final Four.

Congratulations to Mike Wassmer – who correctly forecasted the #2 seed upsets tonight to take a 30 point lead over Tanmay Gautam.  John Bachmann holds on to his Upset pool lead, but it has been shrunk to 2 points by Kelli Shonts.   And Andrew Murphy has taken the lead of the Second Chance Pool over multiple entries 40 points behind.

Congratulations to William England – who managed to go 7 for 8 in the Elite 8 to take a 10 point lead at 750 points over Nathan Standley and Audra Lifson.  It is a crazy tight tournament at the moment, as David Chamowitz and Michael Swinson are tied for 4th at 730 points, Mike Wassmer, John Bachmann and John Johnson are tied for 6th at 720 points, and Robert Ahles, Sharon Thornton, Bill Carter, Jack White, Cinde Johnson are all tied at 9th with 700 points.   What might be even more interesting is that within our top 10, our leaders disagree with who will win – while Kansas is the most common champion picked, 6 of the 8 teams remaining are picked by one of these leaders as their champion (only Notre Dame and Syracuse aren’t represented).   There are 48 entries within 80 points (or one Elite 8 correct winner), so with so many different picks and so many people close, anything could still happen!!!!

In the Upset pool, John Bachmann has taken the lead with 271 points.  He is closely followed by Rick Flynn at 267 points (who correctly got Notre Dame to win tonight), Doug Crowe at 264 points, Kelli Shonts at 261 points, and Kyle Kelly at 260 points (who correctly got Syracuse to win tonight).    So, this has the potential to go down to the wire as well.

In our Second Chance Pool, Jim Wambach has a small lead with the incredible job of going 8 for 8 in the first round.   But he is followed by 14 people (Mark Walsh, Tom Giroir, Bill Kahn, Chris Kelly, Drew Bradley, Rich Napolitano, Andrea Zimmerman, Cheri Searles, Andrew Murphy, Audra Lifson, Peter Lifson, Adam Searles, Brian Lawton and Matt Garda) who got 7 of 8 correct and are just 40 behind.

Some pretty impressive picks by everyone!!!!!!   Good luck to all in the Elite 8!!!

 

 

Gonzaga led for a good amount of the game, but Syracuse never let the game get out of reach.   Gonzaga found themselves up 57-48 with 6:28 off a layup from big man Domantas Sabonis.  That was a big moment for multiple reasons.  The 9 point lead was the largest of the second half for Gonzaga – but it also would be the last time Gonzaga hit a basket from the field.    Syracuse’s suffocating defense kept getting stop after stop, and chipping away at the lead.   Then, with under 25 seconds to play, Michael Gbinijie drives to the basket only to get his shot blocked.  But he refused to be denied, grabbed the offensive rebound and made the layup to give the Orange a 61-60 lead.

Then, it was once again that defense, Trever Cooney looked like he stole the ball in the corner, except the referee had ruled that he stepped out of bounds to get Gonzaga one last chance.   Josh Perkins took one last drive into the lane, but found his shot blocked by Tyler Lydon.   Two free throws later, and the Orange walk away with a 3 point victory over the West Coast Conference tournament champs, and they survive to play Virginia in the Elite 8.   And that ends the Cinderella bid for Gonzaga – the clock has struck midnight (literally) on the mid-major champions.

Congratulations to Syracuse – who continue to incredible run as a 10 seed to the Elite 8 (sorry, but I can’t call an ACC team Cinderella – even if they are a 10 seed).   And as I write this, the Tar Heels have a 16 point lead over the Hoosiers with under 30 seconds.   So, it looks like the ACC will have a complete sweep of Friday night.   So, congratulations to the ACC champions as well, the North Carolina Tar Heels!!!!

In a tournament of amazing finishes, Notre Dame added the luck of the Irish to another incredible finish.  Vitto Brown had just given the Badgers a 3 point lead with 26 seconds off a clutch three-pointer.  And then, everything changed.

Demetrius Jackson, the Irish’s leading scorer, had been held by the Badgers tough defense to 4-16 from the field.  But with the game on the line, Jackson drives quickly down the field and gets a layup to cut the lead to 1.  Then, off the inbounds play, the Irish traps Nigel Hayes in the corner and as he tried to break the trap, he gets the ball stolen by Jackson who quickly takes it to hoop and gives the Irish the lead.

Tonight, Bronson Koenig didn’t have any magic last second victories – his drive to the basket ends up missing – which led to a big time rebound by VJ Beachem.   Then, with the season on the line on the largest stage in college basketball, the 55% FT shooter calmly knocks both FTs down to give the Irish a 3 point lead.

And then, with one last chance, Koenig has the ball stolen again by Jackson – who puts the game out of reach with two more FTs.   That’s right – an 8-0 run in the last 19 seconds led by 2 steals lead the Irish to the Elite 8.   And on a night, when the Irish’s leading scorer was struggling, he found a way to help win the game with his defense.

Congratulations to the Notre Dame Fighting Irish – who become the second ACC school to make the Elite 8 tonight.   Will Syracuse and North Carolina make it a clean sweep for the ACC – we will know in a couple hours.

The ACC has the chance to send 4 teams to the Elite 8 tonight.  And it is pretty certain that the first team of the night will make it – as the Virginia Cavaliers are 26 seconds away from finishing up yet another double digit victory for the favorites.   Fortunately, Wisconsin and Notre Dame are actually playing a tight game that could be entertaining at the end.  I will congratulate the Cavaliers a few seconds early on their victory over Iowa State.

Maryland and Duke kept the games relatively close at half time, but the #1 seeds of Kansas and Oregon ran off in the second halves to get large victories.

Who would have guessed that all four games would be double digit victories for the favorites in a tournament that has been special because of its upsets.

Congratulations to the Jayhawks and Ducks on their dominating performances to advance to the Elite 8.

Congratulations also to Audra Lifson and John Bachmann, who went 4 for 4 in tonight’s games to take the lead away from the Lunatic.   Audra’s 660 points lead the Standard Pool and John’s 265 points lead the Upset Pool.

As for the Lunatic, after going perfect in the first two rounds of the South and West regions, he only could get 1 of tonight’s 4 games correct.  That’s right – the Lunatic went 24 for 24 in the first two rounds, and then having picked all 8 of the teams playing tonight, went 1 for 4.  And as everything seems back to normal in the world, the Lunatic crashes and burns down to a tie for 84th place, with his reign of terror appearing to be over.   The Lunatic still has to be happy that his amazing first weekend has left him in 3rd place of the Upset Pool – but not sure that will hold up either with only Kansas and North Carolina still alive in the tournament.