Stomp The Lunatic

The Dayton Flyers would just not go away – even when they made mistakes to give Syracuse another chance, they quickly took that chance away with a defensive stop.

I do find fantastic irony in this event.  Some of you might have noted some of the posturing by Coach K from Duke around it was silly that the Atlantic 10 was getting 6 teams into the tournament when a stronger conference like the ACC might only get 5.

The posturing might have even worked – as North Carolina State got a surprising 6th bid for the ACC (and they demonstrated that they belonged as they won their play-in game and almost upset St. Louis – the A-10 regular season champion in the second round).

Bur here is the bigger irony.  Dayton was the 6th team from the A-10.  And so after mighty Duke lost to Atlantic Sun champion Mercer, the 6th best team from the A-10 ended the tourney early for a second protected seed ACC team.  The funniest part to me about this is the Flyers are the only one left from the A-10.  That’s right, the only Atlantic 10 team that is still playing is the one Coach K said it was silly that they should be getting in.  And meanwhile, the only ACC teams left do not include Duke or Syracuse – it is just conference champion Virginia and the UNC Tar Heels left to carry the ACC banner.

I guess there is a reason they play the games.  Regardless, congratulations to the 6th best team from the Atlantic 10 – the Flyers have shown through their upsets of Ohio State and Syracuse that regardless of some opinions of one of the best minds in college basketball, they belonged in the Dance – and are the ones who will be hoping to continue to write their Cinderella story.

Meanwhile – I have to chuckle.  The whole day has spent watching defensive battle after defensive battle.   So far, 4 of the 5 games that have gone final have ended with the losing team not getting past 53 points (and Texas only got to 65).   And while I know Oregon likes to run up and down, it makes me chuckle that Wisconsin – a team known for slowing down the game to a crawl is winning 67-63 with a full 10 minutes left to play.   Of course, it would be the Badgers game that turns into a shootout.

First, Florida earns the first trip to the Sweet 16 while holding Pitt to 45 points (a team that averaged 72.5 points during the season and scored 77 in their opener against Colorado).

Then, watched an ugly first half as Louisville holds St. Louis to just 16 points in the first half (a team that averages 70 points during the season).  Whats more amazing is that after holding the Billikens to 16, they are still only up by 9.

I love to see good defense – but it would be fantastic if people at least made some of their more open shots.  For example, St. Louis and Louisville is 8-14 from the line.  They might be playing some great defense, but no one is guarding you when you are shooting from the line – and they are still missing them.  Maybe the basket will open up a little bit in the second half.

Well, after a wild start of the day, the upsets slowed down in the late games.  Sadly, home town heros VCU went down – but Stephen F Austin was the only upset of the evening games.   Although have to admit that Coastal Carolina giving Virginia a scare in the first half would have thrown more brackets into chaos.

Congratulations to our first round leaders – Michael Strange and Kevin Flippen.  Both our leaders were able to get 28 of 32 games correct – really amazing job of picking the games.   They are closely followed by Jack White, Jared Wall, Mike Wassmer, Dooomps, Steve ONeill, James Franklin, Justin Gorman, and the Lunatic’s 7 year old son, Charlie Hodgson – all who are 10 points behind.  Charlie is going to be very excited to find out how well he is doing.

As you can imagine, the Upset standings are pretty similar – with Michael Strange, Kevin Flippen and Justin Gorman all leading at 151 points.  Charlie Hodgson is in 4th at 144 points – followed by Dooomps at 139 points.

Surprisingly, the Lunatic is having a relatively good showing – as he is lurking in the group at 250 pts – tied for 27th place.   But don’t worry, the Lunatic curse has already taken out Duke – so it probably won’t be long until he is back in his normal place in the standings.

Congratulations to all our first round leaders!!!!!

 

And so in honor of my children’s picks and my father-in-law.

I’m a Tar Heel Born

I’m a Tar Heel Bred

and when I die, I will be Tar Heel Dead

So it’s Rah! Rah! Carolina-lina

Rah! Rah! Carolina-lina

Rah! Rah! Carolina-lina

Rah! Rah! Rah!

 

While it sure looked like it when Providence had a decent size lead, the Tar Heels are not dead yet – as many teams have had to do in this first round – style points don’t count, all you have to do is survive.

Survive – and advance!

 

Might be a new year, but it sure looks like the Lunatic curse is alive as well.  My upset picks had Duke going to the Championship game – so of course, that would mean that the Atlantic Sun champions from Mercer would take them out in the Blue Devil’s first game.

That also ended our last perfect bracket of the tournament.  Dooomps managed to go 16 of 16 in day 1.  But Mercer ended that run of perfection early.  The first day leader is still hanging onto the lead in a tie with Michael Strange and Kevin Flippen.   And the Lunatic’s 7 year old son, Charlie, has managed to get into the small group tied for 4th (of course, he also has Duke in the finals, so his fame this year might be fleeting).

So, since the Lunatic knows that his teams are probably doomed – lets go for crazy upsets as well.   Let Wichita State, Virginia, Iowa State, and UCLA – none of the top 4 protected seeds that have played today have managed to win by large amounts – the underdogs are sticking around – if the top seeds aren’t careful, they might suffer the same fate as the Blue Devils……

 

First Connecticut and St. Joseph’s go to overtime.   Then, St. Louis comes back from 16 points back with just 8 minutes left to send North Carolina State to overtime.

OT just starting – sure hope all those missed FTs don’t cost the Cinderella Wolfpack the game.  Hate to think that a team had as many chances to wrap the game up as they did.

And over in the last remaining 7 pm game, 12 seed North Dakota State has a 6 point lead over Oklahoma.  How fun is this!!!!  Just fantastic games!!!!!!!!!!!!

Looks like we have 357 entries this year – so should be a lots of fun!!!!!!!   And if the afternoon is any indication, with Dayton and Harvard pulling exciting upsets and Albany hanging with #1 seed Florida in the first half, this should be a fantastic tournament!

On the lighter side of things, since the Ohio State loss crushed my billion dollar dream, I was curious about how the rest of the pool is doing.

If this was the Billion Dollar Bracket contest, through just 6 games, there are only 15 perfect brackets.  Considering there are 57 more games to go, I imagine that Warren Buffett’s billion dollars is going to be safe.

But you don’t have to be perfect to win the Stomp the Lunatic contest – all you have to do is beat our resident crazy person (well, and the rest of the pool…..)

Good luck to everyone in Stomping the Lunatic!!!!!