Why You Wont Win Your Office March Madness Pool

There is one guarantee in predicting who will win this years’ March Madness pool in your office—it will not be you. 

If you have found your way to this site, you love basketball and probably watch your fair share of college basketball.  This is your problem.  When trying to succeed in any March Madness pool, having even a layman’s understanding of specific matchups, injury reports, preferred defenses and geographic advantages is a recipe for failure and inter-office ridicule.

If you spent today’s lunch talking to your coworkers about how seeding Duke over Syracuse, but giving Villanova a number two seed, is a contradiction in the Selection Committee’s methodology, you would be right, but you are also doomed.  You might as well donate your entry fee to this website rather than freely give it to your office pool’s eventual winner, Jerry from accounting who never says 'hi' when he passes you in the hallway.

But your inevitable bracket failure is no reason to revolt against the tournament like Elin Woods with a 3-iron on Thanksgiving night.  Instead, you only need to come to terms with the fact that the same reason you can’t win your office pool is the same reason that the tournament is so exciting—all of the games are unpredictable, even for the so-called “experts.”

March Madness has shown us that high seeds can make playoff runs and sometimes Cinderella does dance past midnight.  Since the field was expanded to 64 teams, here is a breakdown of the seeds to make the Final Four:

#1 – 43 appearances (44.7%)
#2 – 20 appearances (20.8%)
#3 – 12 appearances (12.5%)
#4 – 9 appearances (9.4%)
#5 – 4 appearances (4.1%)
#6 – 3 appearances (3.1%)
#7 through # 11 – 5 appearances (5.2%)

And the National Champion breaks down like this:

#1 – 15 winners (62.5%)
#2 – 3 winners (12.5%)
#3 – 3 winners (12.5%)
#4 – 1 winners (4.2%)
#5 through #8 – 2 winners (8.4%)

Keeping in mind that each year four teams have a #1 seed, which means that 64% of teams in the Final Four are seeded #2 or higher, and 38% of the time, a team seeded #2 or higher has won the national championship. 

In 1985, a #8 seed was crowned national champion!  I don’t care how high your basketball IQ is or how many match-up projections you run, you aren’t picking an 8 seed to win your bracket.

In the end, any team can win a one game series.  Even the Clippers have beaten the Lakers, Celtics, Bulls and Nuggets this year.  If that doesn't prove my point, nothing does.  This isn’t a 7 game series with home court advantage; it’s a win-or-go-home tournament on a neutral floor. 

And this is why you can’t win.  Jerry from accounting isn’t afraid to take Richmond to make the Final 4 because his mother’s labradoodle was born there, and he hears it’s quite lovely this time of year.  For every Richmond, there is a Jerry, and once “the upset” happens this March, you’re done.

But as basketball fans, we live for this tournament, so we can’t complain too loudly.  Enjoy the next 3 weeks, stock up on Red Bull and sore throat lozenges, and keep your brackets handy.  It’s going to be fun ride.

With that being said, who do you have winning it all?

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