Now sorting through the entries begins… if everyone pays (and I think everyone is pretty much accounted for, even if we have to strongarm a couple of old-timers), we’ll have either 99, 100, or 101 entries (not including any that could come through the mail – which I don’t think I’ve received any in years).
Here in Austin, we get the stinkin’ Kansas game. Why not Xavier-Georgia? Well, I guess I’ll try March Madness on Demand…
It’s 5 am here in Austin, and after only 1.5 hours sleep the past 48 hours, I’m bushed… and I still have to make my picks. BTW, as an unstated policy, we’ll be posting David and my picks before 9 am PDT (which is 11 am here!). Here is David’s:
http://www.hwci.com/ncaa/2008/picksprintPaypalconf.asp?entries=The+Mighty+Mobelfakta
We have either 87 or 88 entries so far which puts us back on pace as last year so we may not top 100 entries. There’s still the chasing down the money part, but we should have a clear idea of the number of entries by Friday night.
After missing our 6:50 am flight by being early by 43 minutes (more on that later), we are finally in Austin in our hotel at 2 am in the morning. Which means I’m about 50 entries behind… it’ll be a long night…. please be patient….
Here’s a sneak peak in what the 40 entries have picked to win thus far (as you can see, no one has picked Cal State Fullerton yet):
| Team | # of players who chose team to | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Win it All |
Win 5 Games |
Win 4 Games |
Win 3 Games |
Win 2 Games |
Win 1 Game |
Win 0 Games |
|||
| UCLA | 17 | 8 | 8 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 0 | ||
| N CAROLINA | 12 | 11 | 7 | 7 | 3 | 0 | 0 | ||
| KANSAS | 4 | 5 | 16 | 9 | 6 | 0 | 0 | ||
| TENNESSEE | 3 | 3 | 2 | 19 | 10 | 2 | 1 | ||
| MEMPHIS | 2 | 4 | 11 | 11 | 12 | 0 | 0 | ||
| TEXAS | 1 | 2 | 10 | 13 | 11 | 3 | 0 | ||
| TEXAS AM | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 27 | 12 | ||
So far we’re ahead of the pace of last year but we shall see how many entries we get Wednesday (we got a record 58 last year). Also, if we top 100 entries, we will likely add a 5th place prize, the first time we’ve added a top prize since we added a 4th place prize in 1998 (Year 4). Of course, we take from the rich, so 1st/2nd/3rd/4th places will be a slightly lower % (but still a good payday).
Remember, if you need to make a small correction to your picks, email us (ncaa(at)hwci.com)… if you need to make bigger corrections, re-submit your bracket (call it YourNickname 2 or YourNickname-Update).
I’m off to Austin so hopefully all will be well.
From Don M. (WOODEN_SOLDIER):
Hi Scott & David,
Might want to pass on to the pool, perhaps some people may not know
about this:
http://www.joost.com/featured/marchmadness/
It will operate similarly to the CBS MMOD online feed I’m told, but it
uses P2P to help increase bandwidth so it will likely be a more
reliable connection & might not need to use a “VIP waiting room”.
(The latter is just a guess, but an educated one). 🙂
Best,
Don
I’ll be flying out to Austin tomorrow morning so I’ll be out of internet range til 2 or 3 pm CDT, but I’ll still be able to check my email on my phone… just replying will be tough since I’m not a texting expert yet. But I should be online Wednesday night and Thursday morning (til tip-off, 11 CDT/9 PDT) and if you have any questions, you can gmail chat me at smt0222(at)gmail.com.
Also, please let David or I know if you are mailing a check (and for that matter, let us know you are paying your fee at all ;-)) as soon as possible. The quicker we can confirm everyone’s paid up, the quicker we can get the pool info up (such as prize breakdown).
Always check this blog for the latest info. Also, you can see on the right side I have given a status on who’s paid and which brackets we haven’t got yet. You can also see the nicknames, so you can discuss the ones you like/don’t like here. I like a lot of the new nicknames so far and am afraid to ask where Beefmaster came from. Remember, try not to use punctuation (e.g., $, &, ‘) in your nickname, if possible. Also, there is a 21-character limit and no profanity (Fern).
Right now, there’s a discussion on how far UCLA will go. Feel free to post other comments or brag how good your picks are on the discussion board.
We have 31 entries thus far, which is outpacing 2007’s record breaking year.
Never say die. As if 97 teams in some tournament isn’t enough, along comes the College Basketball Invitational (CBI) which allows 16 more teams (even some under .500) to continue playing well into March. So we have the 64-team NCAA tourney (ok, 65, geez, that’s such an odd number (no pun intended)), a 32-team NIT, and now a 16-team CBI. What’s next? The 8-team Who Cares tourney? Then the 4-team Semi-Good tourney followed by the 2-team Automatic Final tourney and the 1-team We are the Champs tourney?
Meanwhile, at midnight, we have a record 19 entries for a Sunday-Monday timeframe. Six are new entries and seven are online entries (those who found us on the web somehow… and trust us!). I expect the regulars to be hitting the entries around Wednesday morning.
As of 6 pm Monday, we’ve had a record-breaking 16 entries for a Monday. We need just two more to be ahead of the 2005 pace when we 17 after Sunday & Monday. Every entry seems legit thus far with only two (both veterans – Wendy B. & Chris F.) yet to communicate how to get their fee in. And in a change of pace, five have actually PREPAID (!) their fee (maybe they want to make sure they don’t use it for gas money :-)). We’ve had two people enter three times (the max), which ties a record set last year (usually, just Robinson C. enters 3 picks).
Also, if you are using PayPal and want to do the credit card option, make sure you send the money to smt0222(at)yahoo.com, not hwci(at)hotmail.com. Only the former can accept credit card payments.
If you’ve tried to email ncaa(at)hwci.com you may have gotten a rejection. It should be active now. Entries are starting to trickle in (even payments).
David has gotten the online entry form up and it looks ready for everyone to enter. This is the first time in 3 years we got it up on Sunday (travel and website issues hampering the past two years). The initial email will go out late tonight but if you are anxious, feel free to enter now.
I don’t know if they’ve done this is previous years, but they’ve already announced the opening round game (Coppin St v Mt St Mary’s) prior to the bracket reveal. This seems odd… maybe airfares go up in an hour? I wonder if UCLA will get the winner?