Saturday, March 23, 2019 
Issue # 4.2.1 "Chalk + Auburn"
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CYRPESS COSTCO/CERRITOS, CA (smt)- Surprising SEC tournament champion #5MW-Auburn continued its hot run in routing #4MW-Kansas to advance to the Sweet 16 with 7 favorites.  #3E-LSU blew a 15-point second half lead and trailed by 3 before Tremont Waters drove for a layup with 1.6 seconds left to break a 67-67 tie.  #2MW-Kentucky struggled against #7MW-Wofford in winning by six but the other six (#2W-Michigan, #4W-Florida St, #1W-Gonzaga, #2E-Michigan St, and #3S-Purdue) all won by at least 12 points.  That means 26 of 40 games were blowouts and just 4 of 40 were one possession games.  Yawn. 

There were great performances, more than I remember from another tournament with #12W-Murray St's Ja Morant excelling with 28 points in the loss, Purdue's Carsen Edwards scoring an absurd 42 points, and the Zags' Brandon Clarke scoring 36 points and blocking 5 shots.  One star who failed to produce was Wofford's Fletcher Magee who after setting the career record for 3s with 509 in the last game, just needed four to tie Steph Curry's single-season record of 162.  But he instead set the record for most missed threes without a make, going 0-for-12.  And his demeanor is the same as Curry's, arrogant and just putting up 3s late despite teammate Nathan Hoover hitting 4-of-5 threes (Curry's selfish and dumb threes (which of course he missed) late against Cleveland is the only reason Lebron has a ring in Cleveland)).

With the first 7 games going chalk, CanUBeatA6Grader (2nd, 73 pts) was leading but Auburn's slight upset sent Slamjam51 3 into the lead with 74 points.  Slamjam51 3 was one of 8 to go 8-0 on the day with ChuckPersonCellBlock moving to a tie for 3rd (72) from a tie for 35th and GoBigBlue and John Galt jumping into a tie for 67th (was tied for 136th).  StayingUpLate fell hard from a tie for 1st to a tie for 44th (66).  Maitai is still in last with 38 pts but picked up a respectable 4 wins.  Seanyd only got 1 of 8 correct to fall to 160th (47) from a tie for 79th.  The 162 entries averaged 5.8 wins of the 8 games today.

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   Tids & Bits - Auburn hit 13 three-pointers (25 in two games)... the Zags made their 5th straight Sweet 16, longest current streak... at one point, Edwards (25 pts) was outscoring the whole Villanova team (24) when Purdue launched to a 32-point lead... UCI has won 17 in a row... the rare intra-conference matchup this year saw Big Ten's Michigan still rout conference-mate #10E-Minnesota by at least 20 again (25 in regular season)... 154 picked MSU, 151 Zags, 150 KY, 138 Michigan, 109 FSU, 94 LSU, 83 Purdue, and 61 Auburn (80 had Kansas)... 2 lost Maryland as their champ while one each lost defending champ #6S-Villanova, Kansas, and #10W-Florida (you know who you are!)... top 12 seeded teams still alive (Kansas was #13)... the SEC went 3-1 and Big Ten went 3-2... Kentucky's Tyler Herro has hit 66 of 67 since Christmas, ah, such a luxury to have great free throw shooters these days...

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Four new ties on the PriusV, ready to roll back to Goleta :-(...
Scott