CERRITOS, CA (smt)- All 8 teams seeded 4 or higher advanced to the second round but #2W-Memphis needed a reserve to score 35 points (10 3-pointers) while #3E-Villanova & #4W-Gonzaga, both playing very close to home, had to rally to victory.  #1S-UNC (without Ty Lawson), #1W-UConn (without coach Jim Calhoun) scored in triple digits in easy wins while #4W-Washington, #2E-Duke, and #2S-Oklahoma had little trouble.  Memphis thought they deserved a #1 seed but UConn showed why they were seeded #1 by winning by 56 points (3rd largest tourney rout ever).

#9W-Texas A&M (beating #8W-BYU again), #10W-Maryland, and #7E-Texas won comfortably while #8S-LSU (beating darling mid-major #9S-Butler, who had won their last 4 1st round games), #5W-Purdue (who won their 11th straight 1st round game), #10S-Michigan, #6E-UCLA, and #12S-Western Kentucky should have won comfortably.  Michigan blew all but a point of its 15 point lead with 6 minutes left and UCLA blew all but a point of its 9 point lead with 4 minutes left as they both survived buzzer beater attempts.  Purdue almost blew an 8-point lead with 2 minutes left and Western Kentucky, who won their second straight 1st round game as a #12 seed, decided to turn the ball over at least 7 times in the last 4:30 to allow #5S-Illinois to cut a 17-point lead to 2 with 8 seconds left.

A record 62 entries were received on Wednesday (previous 58 in '07) and that was followed by a record 27 entries on Thursday morning (previous 18 in '00) to push the final unofficial total to a record 114 (previous 101 in '08).  A record 98 people are in our pool (previous 82 in '07 & '08) including 19 new people (thanks to Yumi S, Fernando B, Ken B., and Quang P for bringing in at least 2 people).  So this must mean the economy will still stink for another year.  Maybe we'll get less entries next year and get the economy back on track :-)
 

Buckeye Mike went a perfect 16-0, only the third person to do in 914 entries over 15 years.  The other two (Bloomers123 and Blueberry in 2003) finished 27th and second to last, so it's not necessarily a good sign.  But four entries who are in last at 10-6 would love to be 16-0.  Eleven entries are 15-1 as it is still very early.  The biggest upset was the last game of the day with only 39 picking Western Kentucky.  Two picked #15W-CSUN and two picked #13S-Akron, both games being surprisingly very competitive for most of the game. 

You can now go and see the Who's Who of the pool and find out who is Alan!Alan!He's Da Man and the other colorful nicknames.  You can post the reasoning behind your nickname (like why C$?) on our discussion forum.

    Tids & Bits:  Thirty entries were 3-0 (Baby Ouija 0-3), 18 were 8-0 and six were 15-0 to start the day... Clemson's Terrence Oglesby was ejected; I wonder when the last straight out ejection was... both Texas A&M and Maryland's upsets were picked by more than half the entries... 13 different teams were picked to be champs (the most was 14 in '04)... lowest seeds picked to win are #4MW-Wake Forest (by 2), #5W-Purdue, and #5E-Florida St... #11W-Utah St. was picked to make the Final Four and #13W-Mississippi St. (oops!) was picked by 2 to make the Elite 8... 8 entries lost one of their Elite 8 teams but everyone has their Final Four intact... G's Up Ho's Down might have gone 13-3 but those 3 losses were all Sweet 16 teams... Gareth M ponied up ten bucks to include President Obama's picks as his second entry (Presidential Picks) and let's hope the President's day job goes better than his bracket, which is tied for 92nd place... Scott T's second entry Pre-Selection Picks, picked before the brackets were announced, is also tied for 92nd place...