Round 3

Hoop stars, First of all, I want fess up and personally apologize to Brian Wolf, whom I left off the second round rankings. Must have been his intimidating bracket that made me subconsciously misplace it. Not to worry, all is right now, although he has passed by most of the field with his 13 bonus points from 4 upset picks. As we gear up for the sweet sixteen, set to tip in less than 24 hours!, there is need to, once again, catch up with the 3rd round happenings. While we saw 7 low seed upsets in the second round, the third round exhibited much greater big name carnage, as Syracuse, Kansas, Villanova, and # 1 seed Wichita State went down in shocking fashion. Although, Wichita State was matched up with a Kentucky team that began the season ranked #1 in the nation. I can appreciate the intellect of this year’s pool as 12 of you correctly picked the Wildcats to advance, well done. Others were not so lucky, like Beth who was livin’ the dream and sittin pretty Friday night, but come Sunday, her dreams may have been dashed with Wichita State as her champion. Or “what about Bob”, who also had the shockers winning it all. Notorious for his outlandish picks over the years, the mustache made much more reasonable selections this year, yet somehow finds himself battling for the basement. And then Lindsay, oh boy…. Also a believer in Wichita State, she now finds her bracket nearly finished, only able to score a maximum of 12 points out of a remaining possible 96, ouch. Villanova came into the tourney as a bit of head scratcher. Most felt the cats weren’t too deserving of a 2 seed, and UConn quickly confirmed the hesitation as Shabazz Napier went bananas on a seemingly overmatched Villanova squad. That “upset “ didn’t hurt few in the pool, as most had the cats out well before the final four, except for 1 drowsy mountain man, who must have slept through the early tourney analysis. Thacker rolled the dice on Nova, and paid mightily. Picking them to win it all was a long shot, now I’m just hoping to get that $10 before he falls asleep again. Congrats though to Greg K, Greg T, Rebecca, Molly, Jennifer, and myself for accurately advancing UConn.. And so the sweet sixteen is set, including 3 double digits seeds: #10 Stanford who slayed a shaky Jayhawks squad, #11 Dayton who may just be playing the best basketball of the tourney so far, and #11 Tennessee, who has yet to be tested, crushing both opponents en route to a match up with 2 seed Michigan. Props to Andrew, Brian and yours truly for having Tennessee still alive, and major props to the Longhorn himself, Preston for being the ONLY one to have Dayton flying in the sweet sixteen. It’s still anyones game, as all but 11 have still their championship game intact. Most teams still alive goes to Will D and Brian W for having 12 of 16, incredible job! And, it seems we must be family because the only perfect regional brackets left are Jennifer and myself, accurately navigating the east bracket. Biggest drop of round three was Bob, who fell a staggering 26 slots. Not even the mustache could save that freefall. Biggest rise was Greg K who moved up 9 slots, although, the Wichita State final four could hamper his chances. See below for up to date rankings. Bring on the madness! 1. John F (59 pts) 2. Chad B (56 pts) 3. Will D (55 pts) 4. Brian W (55 pts) 5. Preston T (52 pts) 6. Beth R (52 pts) 7. Mike Z (51 pts) 8. Molly B (50 pts) 9. Erik M (49 pts) 10. Greg T (49 pts) 11. Josh W (49 pts) 12. Matt T (49 pts) 13. Rodell P #1 (48 pts) 14. Jennifer B (48 pts) 15. Rodell P #2 (48 pts) 16. Scott D (48 pts) 17. Scott T (47 pts) 18. Lindsay M (47 pts) 19. Andrew B (46 pts) 20. Deborah M (45 pts) 21. Rebecca F (44 pts) 22. Greg K (44 pts) 23. Chris H (44 pts) 24. Kristal E (44 pts) 25. Carrie P (43 pts) 26. Ashley D (42 pts) 27. Brent A (42 pts) 28. Peter M (41 pts) 29. Kelly M (40 pts) 30. Katie T (40 pts) 31. Barbara A (39 pts) 32. Ed A (38 pts) 33. Abby M (37 pts) 34. Justin T (37 pts) 35. Bob F (37 pts) 36. Ryan M (36 pts) 37. David P (36 pts) Chad (March Madness MC)