I know, I know...where the hell is the spreadsheet with the pool standings? Day 1 standings can be found right here. Jenn had a very good St. Patrick's Day!
Speaking of the most holiest of holidays...when the first round of March Madness takes place on St. Patrick's Day, it becomes the ultimate juggling act for an Irish guy like myself. Before noon, I'm checking the Gmail account that I only use four weeks out of the year because I truly hate Gmail, but Hotmail won't let me send out e-mails to a group of 47 people. While I'm on there, I try to respond to any replies that came in from the opening e-mail and to troubleshoot any problems that Yahoo has caused by not having a user friendly pick 'em template. This year, I learned that the links I provided were forcing people to use the same bracket in multiple pools. Stupid Yahoo.
After that's done and the first game begins, I start copying the picks from everyone's brackets into my nerdy spreadsheet so that my formulas can calculate the pool scores easily. That takes a while to do, but I was able to get the Gamblers Pool finished by the time the Thursday afternoon games were done and the Main Pool finished before my head hit the pillow Thursday night/early Friday morning. Part of the reason this takes so long is because I'm watching the games at the same time. I'm a huge fan. I have to watch the games!
And then because it's St. Paddy's Day, I need to drink beer like I'm Brett Kavanaugh. What can I say? It's a labor of love.
Having gotten everything done by the end of the day on Thursday, you might be wondering why the recap isn't showing up until Sunday evening. Well as complicated as that Thursday schedule was, it got even worse on Friday. My big handicapping day each week is Friday (don't ask why, just accept this as fact and skip the lengthy explanation), so horse racing takes up much of the day. And I did pretty well on Friday. Well enough that I locked down my 10th trip to the National Horseplayers Championship. The day that I qualify to the NHC is the biggest weight-off-my-shoulders day of the year, so I felt the need to celebrate. (Note: Jenn has told me that I never celebrate my wins as much as I, ummm, "grumble" about my losses. So I celebrated the win on Friday.). Bourbon was consumed. Wine was consumed. Recaps weren't written.
On Saturday, I started to catch up on the recaps, but we were also supposed to attend our first ever Bat Mitzvah. I didn't grasp that this event was akin to going to a wedding, so once again, recaps weren't completed.
Which brings us to today. I'm watching the second day of the second round and trying to recap events from several days ago. And I'm delaying any alcohol consumption until I've made some serious headway on this front!
We kicked off Thursday's action with Colorado State taking on Michigan. Before the season, the Wolverines were expected to be one of the best teams in the nation, but they never lived up to the hype. Their head coach, Juwan Howard, was suspended for 5 games after a post-game scrum with the Wisconsin coaching staff. Once they were bounced from the Big 10 tournament in their opening game against Indiana, it was fair to wonder whether they would even qualify for the Big Dance. They did sneak in as an 11 seed, but they did not draw an easy assignment as Colorado State went 25-5 on the season while finishing second in a very competitive Mountain West Conference. About 15 minutes into the game, you had to wonder whether Howard was going to punch someone else as the Rams jumped out to a huge 28-13 advantage. The Wolverines were able to mount a little bit of a run before the half, trimming the lead to 7 at intermission. Whatever formula for success was found in those last five minutes of the opening half was employed throughout the final 20 minutes. Michigan put up 46 points in the second half, completely overwhelming Colorado State as they cruised to a 75-63 victory. First upset of the day. It wouldn't be the last.
South Dakota State was a popular Cinderella pick, coming into the tournament on a 21 game winning streak and having gone undefeated in the Summit League. As the 13 seed, they were taking on the Big East champs from Providence, who were coming off an 85-58 shellacking at the hands of Creighton in their conference tournament. The Friars would score the last 7 points of the first half and to take an 8 point lead after 20 minutes. The Jackrabbits had a tough time closing that gap in the second half with Providence holding them at bay for a long time. South Dakota State was finally able to close within 3 with a minute remaining, but as was the case in the first half, the Friars would finish off the scoring. They accounted for the last six points of the game en route to a 66-57 victory.
In the other two matchups in the early afternoon time slot, Memphis jumped out to a huge 19 point halftime lead over Boise State and then held on late to win 64-53. Then the defending champs took the court and dished out some punishment as Baylor thumped Norfolk State by a score of 85-49.
There were two more blowouts in the late afternoon games. Tennessee followed up their SEC tournament victory by crushing Longwood by a score of 88-56. The second blowout was a bit unexpected as it came in an 8-9 matchup. North Carolina pretended they were playing in Coach K's final home game again, running up the score on Marquette in a 95-63 rout.
How about some competitive games? Well, Gonzaga vs Georgia State didn't spring to mind as a matchup that would be particularly close, but the Panthers did everything in their power to make the overall #1 seed sweat. Georgia State trailed by only 2 at the half, but they didn't let up after the halftime show was over. The Panthers took a two point lead with 13 minutes to play. Could we actually see a 16 seed win for the second time ever? Gonzaga did not look like themselves for the vast majority of this game, but eventually they figured out that they had a huge height advantage on the Panthers and began dumping the ball inside religiously. Clinging to a 59-57 lead, the Bulldogs started playing like a national championship contender, going on a 24-1 run to end Georgia State's shot at an epic upset. It wasn't pretty, but the Zags move on to round two after a 93-72 victory.
Last but not least in the late afternoon was a matchup between two teams that won their respective conference tournaments as lower seeds. Iowa was the #5 seed in the Big Ten, while Richmond was the #6 seed in the Atlantic 10. If the Spiders hadn't won the A-10 tourney on Selection Sunday, some other at-large team would have gone dancing. But they stole that bid away and here they were taking on the Hawkeyes. The teams traded the lead back and forth for the first 25 minutes of the game as Iowa's prolific offense struggled. With the Hawkeyes unable to find the mark from downtown, Richmond's confidence grew and they would open up an 8 point advantage. Iowa would creep back into it late, trimming the lead to 1 with two minutes to go. They were down 3 with a minute left when a controversial no-call would be their undoing. A Richmond player clearly made contact with an Iowa shooter as he attempted a three-pointer to tie the game. There was no whistle though. Richmond grabbed the ball as it fell short of the rim and closed out the game from there. The 5 seed wasn't nearly as lucky for Iowa in this tournament as the Spiders became the bazillionth 12 seed to pull off the 12-5 upset in a 67-63 triumph.
The early evening games would get underway with another 5-12 matchup featuring some ugly offense. UConn was known for playing strong defense and underwhelming offense. New Mexico State was more offensively oriented, but they hadn't played against a team as stingy as the Huskies. How rough was this game early on? It was 2-2 at the first TV timeout. Ouch. The Aggies wouldn't get any easy buckets, but they did have a star player (Teddy Allen) who was eventually going to put the ball in the hoop, while UConn couldn't generate much offense no matter what they did. Allen had 14 points in the first half while the Huskies could only muster 22 as a team. The Aggies led by 10 at the break. I'll just go ahead and tell you that Allen put up another 23 in the second half and let you figure out who won. Another 5 seed gets bounced in round one as New Mexico State takes out UConn by a score of 70-63.
Indiana was looking to make it 3-for-3 for the 12 seeds, but St. Mary's was not as generous with turnovers as Indiana's First Four opponent (Wyoming) had been on Tuesday night. The Hoosiers continued to struggle from the field and the Gaels made them pay. A 5 seed makes it to round two as St. Mary's blows out Indiana by a score of 82-59.
Georgia State had laid the groundwork earlier in the day that anything was possible even though the dam eventually cracked and Gonzaga ran away with their 1 vs 16 matchup. But in theory, a 2 vs 15 game should be even closer, right? Well not many people thought that St. Peter's would give Kentucky a run for their money as the Wildcats were led by likely player of the year Oscar Tshiebwe. And the Peacocks' chances got considerably worse when one of their best defensive players picked up two quick fouls in the first 90 seconds of the game, forcing him to sit out the rest of the first half. But St. Peter's never looked intimidated in this matchup. They played solid halfcourt defense and made Kentucky work for everything. On the other hand, Kentucky looked very much like Gonzaga had earlier in the day. Things that seemed easy for them on the offensive end of the floor throughout the season now felt like a complete struggle. Kentucky was able to get to the free throw a line a ton in the first half, but it didn't matter. The game was deadlocked at 37 at intermission. In the second half, the Wildcats went on a couple of runs and you got the impression that each one might spell the end of the line for the Peacocks. But St. Peter's kept their nerve, even when they trailed by 6 with three minutes to go. They would score the next 7 to take the lead. Kentucky was officially in trouble. As the final minutes wound down, Kentucky looked more and more desperate to have Tshiebwe carry them. And for the most part he did. But it wasn't enough to prevent overtime as St. Peter's hit a jumper late to tie the game. Tshiebwe would make the first two buckets in the extra period, but the Wildcats offense would stall out after that. The Peacocks would go on a 10-1 run to take command, eventually knocking down a bunch of free throws to seal the upset. Hope you had this 15 seed advancing on your bracket because you just got a ton of upset points if you did. Kentucky is sent home, losing to St. Peter's, 85-79.
That would not be the only OT game in the early evening session. It was hard to watch much of the Creighton - San Diego State matchup due to how captivating the St. Peter's - Kentucky game was, but it sure looked like the Aztecs had this one under control, leading by 9 with only 2:30 remaining. But San Diego State stopped scoring, while the Bluejays did not. Nine in a row by the Bluejays tied the game at 62, but a foul against Creighton with 7 seconds left looked like it might save the Aztecs. They went to the line for a 1-and-1 and missed the front end. On to overtime we would go. San Diego State found their offense again, going up by 3, but Creighton battled back to take the lead by 2. With only a few seconds remaining, the Aztecs ran one of the most predictable out-of-bounds plays you will ever see. Their best player threw the ball inbounds, passing it to their big man at the top of the key. There was a 100% chance that he was immediately passing the ball back to San Diego State's best player. The Bluejays defender converged on the return pass, a turnover ensued, and Creighton was moving on. San Diego State's 72-69 OT defeat meant that the Mountain West's 4 teams had all lost their opening games. Forget that I described that conference as "very competitive" earlier in this recap.
Four more games to cap off the night if you weren't asleep, drunk, or both by this time of the night. We'll start with the easiest result of the last 4 games. Texas Southern is very good in Dayton. They did not play Kansas in Dayton. Kansas lead at the half by 28, then cruised to a 83-56 victory. The other three matchups were nailbiters. Two of them involved 4-13 matchups. Arkansas doesn't have the strongest history in the early rounds of the NCAA tournament and they were taking on a dangerous Vermont team who had a bit of a home court advantage with this game taking place in Buffalo, NY. This game had a similar feel to the Providence - South Dakota State game earlier. Seeding was the same, as was the game trend. The lower seed played tough for most of each half, while the higher seed seemed to find just a little more in the latter stages of each 20 minute block. This game was tied at 27 late in the first half, but the Razorbacks scored the final 7 points before the break. The Catamounts stormed back to take the lead early in the second half, but with about 8 minutes to go, Arkansas countered with a 13-5 run to take a 9 point lead. Vermont would close to within 2 with seconds to go, but Arkansas calmly went to the line and made two free throws to seal the deal. Arkansas moves on after a 75-71 scare from Vermont.
The roles were reversed in the other 4 vs 13 matchup, as it was the Akron Zips that actually controlled most of the action in their game against last year's surprise Final Four team, UCLA. The Bruins found themselves down 8 in the first half before climbing back into it, but as the second half progressed, Akron began to pull away again. It was 47-39 with less than 8 minutes to go before UCLA went into full lockdown mode on the defensive end. They made sure nothing came easy for the Zips as they slowly closed the gap on the scoreboard. Akron would only manage 6 points in those final 8 minutes as UCLA denied the 13 seed from being the latest upset winner on a wild Day 1. The Bruins survive with a 57-53 victory.
That left one game to round out the night and I have to admit that it was the 1st round matchup I was most looking forward to. Two really solid mid-major clubs meeting up in a 7-10 clash. Murray State's resume was similar to South Dakota State's: 30 wins and an undefeated record in the Ohio Valley Conference. They were taking on the San Francisco Dons, the third team from the West Coast Conference to earn a bid in this year's tournament. San Francisco was trying to emerge from the shadow created by the two big guns from their conference: Gonzaga and Saint Mary's. These two teams did not disappoint. The first half featured a lot of offense and back-and-forth action. The Dons would hold a slim one point edge at the break. The Racers seemed to be getting the better of San Francisco as the second half wore on, building up an 8 point lead with only 2 minutes to go. But the Dons refused to go quietly. They hit a 3, got a stop, made 2 free throws, got another stop, hit another 3 and we were off to yet another overtime on day 1. This overtime was without a doubt the most entertaining one to watch so far in this year's tournament. Players on both teams had this look on their face that seemed to say "you can't stop me". There were no signs of exhaustion. Just bucket after bucket. With a minute left, the Racers were leading the overtime session by a score of 14-12. It was San Fran's turn to answer, but they finally missed. That was the only cushion Murray State would need. Each team would make one more basket, but the Racers had the luxury of closing things out at the free throw line from there. Hope you stayed up for possibly the best played game of round 1 as Murray State prevailed with a hard fought 92-87 win.
That's it for Day 1. The recaps for the rest of this weekend's action will be up tomorrow!
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