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Thursday, March 20, 2014 Issue # 2.1.1 "Overtime & Perfection" [ Home | Blog | Twitter | Facebook | Updates ]
EL SEGUNDO, CA (smt)- Where to begin? The NCAA Selection Committee should just admit they are seeding to get good matchups instead of actually ranking the teams as most of the double-digit seeded teams held their own making for exciting basketball but one has to question the seeding system. Just because a #12 has won almost every year doesn't mean it HAS to. There were 3 upsets early (#11S-Dayton, #9S-Pitt, and #12E-Harvard) with the latter two not surprising most people. Top seeds struggled with #1S-Florida, #4MW-Louisville, #4W-SDSU, and #5MW-St Louis all holding on to victories. Only #2W-Wisconsin, #3S-Syracuse, #4E-Michigan St, #2MW-Michigan, #7W-Oregon, and #2E-Villanova pulled away to easy wins. The last 8 games saw four overtimes (won by #7E-UConn, St. Louis, #12W-ND St, and SDSU) and almost a 5th, but we had our first buzzer beater (i.e., shot goes in at 0.0) in a long time as #7MW-Texas nipped #10MW-Arizona St. Aaron Craft almost had a buzzer beater for #6S-Ohio St, but his team was about a second or two late in quickly inbounding the ball to him as his shot just banked off. Every Buckeye on the court but Craft thought they lost game after the Flyers went up with 3.8 seconds left.
As for our 20th HWCI NCAA Pool, like the Denver Broncos, the entries poured in during the first three days pushing the total to a record 110 entering Thursday but when it needed to count it fluttered to the finish line, getting only 28. But unlike the Broncos, it was enough to win the most entries ever as 138 topped the 134 we had two years ago. We even had 2 mail-in entries, which is the first time in a long, long time.
We also had a record 104 people submit at least one entry, the first time we topped 100.
Hawkeye and FC Nordsjaelland
went a perfect 16-0 to become our 4th and 5th
players to do so (Blueberry & Bloomers123 in
'03, Buckeye Mike in '09) and are in a great position for our
$500+ top prize (which is a far way off from a
billion dollars). On the
flip side Princess Kahlo was last at 8-8. With just four
upsets (though it could've been a lot worse), the separation points were
97 picked Pitt, 55 Harvard, 37 ND St, and 27 Dayton.
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Wow, 13 1/2 hours of basketball seems like
a dream, but is a nightmare if lack of sleep the day before...