I guess it's better than last year...so far!
I still have three of my four Final Four picks moving on to the second round, while this time last year I was cursing the basketball gods after losing my champion and another final qualifier on the first day.
At least this year, I wasn't naive enough to pick Washington State to win it again, right?
Every year millions of us trek to websites and newspapers, get stuffed full of college basketball analysis, and fill out our brackets only to be disappointed with our picks within the first two days of the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament. For the few who are able to withstand the first two rounds without losing one of their Final Four picks, I salute you.
This year, I decided to take a different approach than past years. I decided to fill out my brackets dumb.
No that's not a typo, I really did that this year.
The last two years, I watched more college basketball than I wanted to and paid attention to more analysis than I would have likeed; only to have progressively worse brackets each year.
This year, I paid little to no attention to the conference races, the polls, and the conference tourney's, except of course tracking my beloved Pacific Tigers. After the season, (knowing the Tigers were not going dancing) I selected my brackets paying attention only to record, conference, past knowledge of the team, coaching, and history of the program.
Like I said, I filled out my bracket dumb.
After day one, I really thought I was on to something. Out of the sixteen games, I picked all but one and really, did anyone outside of Kansas think USC was going to lose to K-State?
O.K., maybe someone did.
Maybe, someone that knew less than me actually picked them to win. So, as I sat atop my pool this morning, I couldn't help but boast when seeing a fellow competitor.
I was feeling real good!
Although, I'm normally watching the game on my PC while working, I wasn't able to during the first wave of games Friday morning. What?!?! I didn't say that I couldn't work and watch PC-TV at the same time! Anyway, doesn't everyone?
When I finally tune back into the tourney, I come to find that I've lost one of my Sweet 16 teams, St. Mary's, and Gonzaga is about to do their usual nosedive against a lesser opponent. Instead of asking myself, "Why didn't you see that coming?" I went along with my day and paid it no attention.
I guess I should probably tell you that my Final Four teams this year are Georgetown, North Carolina, Stanford, and...well hold on. So I tune back in a couple of hours later only to find out that UCONN has finally tied San Diego and the game is going into overtime.
UCONN has it in the bag right?
Err, well it turns out, they didn't and yes they were my last Final Four team.
At the time of this writing, I'm eight out of fifteen so far with Villanova and Clemson tied and 1:37 left on the clock. I picked Clemson to make it to the Sweet 16, sorry Tiger fans. I guess I can take solace in the fact that even though my new method didn't pay off, at least I didn't put a ton of effort into it.
Maybe next year, I'll consult a psychic while filling in my brackets. Does anyone know if Cleo is still around?
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5 months ago
I tried the same approach, and I'm getting the same results.
I guess there's always next year.
(We all knew that Western Kentucky would reach the Sweet Sixteen, didn't we?)
4 months ago
I did one bracket based on which mascot would win in a fight (with the exception of the 1-3 seeds in the first round who went a combined 12-0). I did make some exceptions like allow a cardinal to win a few games and a hurricane to lose. But my championship game has the bruins defeating the cougars. My mascot bracket only has one less win than my real bracket (although i did enter both in a pool) and I have 6 of 8 and 7 of 8 elite eight teams left respectively.
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