When someone sent out the memo that this was supposed to be a tournament with no upsets, they forgot to inform the 11 seeds.

First, Xavier continues to deny the odds.   In a late January game against St. John’s, the Musketeers lost their star guard Edmond Sumner to an ACL injury.  They went through February in a free fall, only being able to beat DePaul.   But Xavier managed to upset Butler in the Big East tournament to show they could still beat at-large talented teams to get into the tourney.    Then, yesterday, they were only one of two teams to pull an upset based on seeds – beating Maryland 76-65.

Today, USC came back from double digits for the second time this week to upset 6 seed SMU 66-65.   I am still surprised by how often this happens.  Every year, there are a couple teams that people say didn’t deserve to make the tournament (although this year has been a little bit more quiet than usual).  And every year, I find myself writing that you should pick that team to win – they seem to be so thankful the Selection Committee chose them, they play out of this world.   Welcome to the Second Round, USC Trojans – you have proven that you deserve to be at the dance.

Finally, Rhode Island went from potentially not even being in the tournament about a week beforehand, to winning the Atlantic Tournament, to beating Creighton 84-72.  What an amazing couple of weeks of momentum for the Rams.

The only 11 seed who hasn’t played is Kansas State – who won their First Four play-in game against Providence.   Considering Kansas State was the other team in the list of teams mentioned as lucky to be in the tournament considering they had a losing record in the Big 12, and that the other three 11 seeds won, I would not be happy if I was 6 seed Cincinnati.