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Wednesday, March 16, 2016

EL SEGUNDO, CA (smt)- I hope the first two games of the tournament are no indication of what’s to come as #16Ea-FGCU trounced #16Eb-Fairleigh Dickinson by 30 and #11Sb-Wichita St knocked off #11Sa-Vandy by 20.  Hope for some close matches and some good upsets.  It’s amazing there are multiple ways to watch the game but in a car, it’s not on the radio.  Thank goodness for TuneIn radio so was able to hear the blowouts on my long drive home.

So there was apparently a leak of the bracket thirty or so minutes into a 2-hour long debacle of a Selection Show.  It’s one of many things I’ve been oblivious of the past several months (there was a terrorist attack nearby in San Bernardino?   Star Wars TV spots were airing maybe spoiling the film a little bit?) as work and family schedules ramped up.  But this pool is fun and worth all the work that goes into it.

With 69 entries with 18 hours to go (on graph, Hour 66), we are just slightly off 2014’s (72) and 2015’s (73) paces.  If you look at the historical trends since we’ve been doing this entry form since 2002, you can see the majority of the entries come tonight (you can see that last year, from 3 pm to midnight we got 50 entries (from 73 to 123) — that seems like it will be very hard to duplicate).  And remember, if we top last year’s record of 161 entries, I’ll donate an additional $25 to charity.

Speaking of which, in our 6th HWCI NCAA First Four For Charity contest, 15 people got both games correct but
it’s Mike M who leads with the smallest point differential of 34 (which is large due to the two blowouts).  Two went 0-2 with Sam S last with a 58 point differential. With 21 entries, that’s $42 I’ll donate to Star Wars: Force For Change.  BTW, have you checked on the SW:FFC activations, which one is the UNICEF Kid Power program where you can buy your kid a fitness device that will help unlock food packets to kids in Africa the more active your kid is.  I saw a presentation on this at the IEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference last year in Seattle and it’s an interesting concept. There’s at least $9 from other members so we’re off to a great start.

Enter online now! You can also fax your entry to me at (720) 368-0816 or email us for a snail mail address (postmarked by Thursday AM). Make arrangements (such as PayPal) to send in your $10 entry fee(s) by March 18th. Complete rules and daily pool information can be found on the official site: http://www.HWCI.com/ncaa.

We are now on Twitter (@HWCI_Pools).  Please follow!  I will post using #hwciNCAA mini-updates during the day so you can follow without being on Twitter (and if you are, please use #hwciNCAA).  Please join our Facebook HWCI NCAA Pool Group or post comments on our blog.  Here you can join the group and meet your competitors, make new friends, set up NCAA watching gatherings, and post stuff to the wall (pictures, witty comments, etc.). 

You can mail your entry fee (email me for snail mail) or give your $10 (per entry) to someone who will give the money to David or Scott. We are accepting PayPal (check or PayPal funds only) to “hwci<at>hotmail.com” or credit card PayPal payments to “smt0222<at>yahoo.com” (but the entry fee is $10.61 (61 cents in PayPal fees… damn them!)).  Now, you can send money via your smartphone and pay no fees!  Use Google Wallet’ Send Money function and send your $10 (per entry) to “smt0222<at>gmail.com” — just make sure you put your NAME and NICKNAME in the notes section. And if you’re having trouble getting your picks in, take a picture of your bracket with your phone and email it to ncaa<at>hwci.com.

   Tids & Bits – So far, there are 7 new people who are joining our pool, so welcome!… Little Rock, which used to be Arkansas-Little Rock, is also joining our pool (proper 64) for the first time (they lost the 2011 First Four game against UNC Asheville)… Note that some symbols (e.g., ?) are not form-friendly so careful picking a nickname… Stephen F Austin has a 20-game winning streak… Omaha (Summit) is the lone new team that could’ve qualified (Northern Kentucky, who switched conferences (Atlantic Sun->Horizon) will be eligible next year while Abilene (Southern), Incarnate (Southern), Grand Canyon (WAC), and UMass Lowell (America East) will be eligible in 2018)… no more independents as NJIT moved to Atlantic Sun conference this year… 13S-Hawai’i will be ineligible next year so hopefully they make a good run!… Coastal Carolina will move from the Big South to the Sun Belt next year… every tourney-eligible team except Western Illinois (Summit, 9th place, missed 8-team conference tournament) had a chance to grab the automatic bid…

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Being in 19th place in a free competition does not bode well for me…
Scott