"I'm still calling it 1st round, not 2nd round" NCAA Tourney Open Thread

I don't want my 9 year old cousin to beat me again...

Edit: Wait a minute...Colorado plays UNLV...

I call it the So-So 64, then the Thriving 32, and so on

In my 5 brackets I have one that is perfect and one that has 1 victory from the first four.  How are others starting out?

go murray state!

and...BEAT OHIO!

I am overly skeptical about Murray State. I kind of want them to lose so I can feel right about saying how they were ranked too high all year. I think this officially makes me a hater and I'm not too proud.

Oh, so it's called the 2nd round now?

The morning before March Madness begins and ESPN is talking about Dwight Howard. Get off my lawn, ESPN

Good time of year for sports, March Madness, NFL free agency, and Spring Training with opening day in less than a month. This time of year is 2nd only to Football season starting and MLB playoffs.

Just caved in and made a bracket even though I said I wouldn't this year, but a lady in the dude offered me a bracket so I couldn't say no.  C'mon UNC-Asheville!

I'm marrying into a family of Duke fans. All the men in the family pick Duke to win it all every year.

I grew up a Carolina fan (because I grew up in Chicago and Michael Jordan and all that). I can't wait to watch how this goes down. 

FWIW, I've got Duke losing to Baylor. 

I usually skip class today, but I have an exam at three. Such a bummer.

I hate it because I have two enormous tests coming up in the next week and I can't just sit around watching all the games playing today.

But I love today too, because a club I'm in is doing a tour of the Big House, so I'm going to be taking a tour of the stadium as a study break, so I get to see the locker rooms and walk the field.  I'm pretty damn excited for that.

Just so you all know, I'm being paid to host a tournament day at a local college.  Yea..2 projectors and a flat screen.  Deal with it.

I'm with you.  I'm still calling it "First Round".  Those early games are "Play-In" games as far as I am concerned.

But we don't have a prayer.  We were all never going to call Div 1-AA "FCS", or call the Big Ten East and West Divisions "Leaders" and "Legends".  But the great media marketing machines wore us down.

Hello Second Round.

Those champagne glasses in The Young and the Restless commercial were LARGE.

OMG IT'S HAPPENING!

Tip off :)

lets go murray st.!!!

and the game I really need today is harvard.  I have them in the round of 8.

jdon

Ack. come on Murray State :(

Bill Raftery brings nothing to the table. I hate him.

I love that they brought back the Boss Button for the NCAA's video player. That's pretty funny.

Wish they would kick it off withh 4 games all at once.

Did Vern Oundquist lose an eye!! Oh my god please never show him again.

Is not a holiday to me and will hardly be thought of with opening weekend occuring.  THIS is truly my late Winter/early Spring holiday.  Off work for the rest of the week/weekend; I am soooo...Content.  God I Love this sh*t.

Apparently Murray St. doesn't know how to block out. They look totally lost on offense, too.

This is some sloppy shit right here.

Paul Hornung is still the most undeserving Heisman winner of all time

Despite my pathetic history in Bracketdom, I decided to fill one out anyway about a half hour ago.  I joined a group of Michigan fans on yahoo so my bracket will be on full display if you want to see it taken off life support by Sunday. 

Or maybe you might want to look at it so you can either point and laugh or just feel better about your own bracket.  It's probably the only good that can come from my failures. 

Aaaand Colorado St. can't defend the perimeter.

The Tourney's started.  It's going to be 80 degrees and sunny in DC today.  St. Patricks Day green beer this weekend.

I'm F'd at work.  I can't get motivated to do anything.  

My biggest accomplishments today were e-mailing a spreadsheet and 2 MGoBlog posts.  I'm exhausted from all of that.  I'm taking the rest of the day off.  And tomorrow too, just in case.

They seem to be letting them play in the CSU-Murray State game for sure and from what I've seen of the KSU-USM game they are as well.  Allowing the BigTen style of play can't be a bad thing for our Conference.

That was the nerdiest coach I ever did see. I like him.

I know this was covered somewhat elsewhere but, they're forced to cover Dwight Howard's EGO and NFL Free Agency for the day until they can play highlights on SportsCenter tonight!

Three o'clock class cancelled and I have a brand new case of Shandy from Sam's Club yesterday. With this weather and the tournament on, I cannot describe how much I want to dive in. I have to pick up the girlfriend at 7:30, though, so cracking open the first beer at one would be a terrible idea.

Must...wait...

For people watching via the March Madness Live link, has anyone else noticed you can't change anything once a commercial break starts? This is terribly annoying. you can't even switch to the box scores or anything, or more importantly to a different game. I understand the business reasoning behind this, but I think this is taking it a little far. It would be like your remote control locking once a game on your TV went to commercial break.

Holy crap, Colorado St. looks horrendous in the second half.

Murray State looking good.  Murray State/Marquette should be a fun match-up if Marquette gets by BYU.

Louisville's uniforms look like orange construction cones.

As @Mgoblog pointed out, nice to see Ben Wallace eligible for Murray State. 

Anyone else have Davidson upsetting Louisville? They're keeping it close early.

Also if K-state loses my bracket is already fucked.

This "boss button" thing on the march madness live is awesome.  I'm hitting the button for every commercial break.

So much grit on the floor right now for Colo St.

The 1st-2nd round thing will never be right - throws off all the symmetry.  I try and just ignore the "play-ins" and start today.

Wooo! I'm tied for 382nd in the MGoBracket! Thank you Murray State for stopping Colorado State from making a run to the Sweet 16

KSU up by 3 over Southern Miss

Come on K-State!

No sense of urgency on that possession. Or the next one. 14 seconds left.

Can I just have a perfect bracket for one day..that's all I'm asking..............and a big FU to any Carolina team that isn't red, plus another FU to UK, IU, and of course that damn state down south...................

Southern Miss goes down, along with my perfect bracket.

Wisconsin is playing in front of about 78 people.

Another absolutely brutal first twelve minutes.

The difference is that Marquette has more guys and probably won't feel the need to take their foot of the gas pedal.

Kind of a boring lull right now. Louisville up by 11 late in the second half, Wisconsin up by 13, Marquette blowing out BYU. GIVE ME LONG BEACH STATE OVER NEW MEXICO. And I'm serious about that. I have LBSU going to the Sweet 16.

Because today's games have kinda been stinkers.

That's usually how it goes with round 1...one day kinda meh, the other all about the madness.

But there's a lot of basketball still to be played.

"Altitude is a problem for Montana"

Um...wut?

I know at any moment this will change, but UNC-Ashville is out-gritting Cuse right now.

Up 20-17!

I've seen a few times (while keeping other eyes on my other tv, so I've only seen a couple minutes of this game) where Asheville has some pretty ball movement in and out of that "vaunted" 2-3 zone. 'Cuse has their hands full at the moment.  This team won a game last year and isn't afraid of a Big Bad Big East team.

Till DreisbachTurneroverdrive starts freaking out.

I'm not saying one single thing. I'm just saying if you aren't watching UNC-Ashville - Syracuse, maybe you should.

Kid plays for UNC-Ashville.  Hmmm.  Interesting.  That's just the way it is?!?!

was fab melo really that good / important?

I think I'm gonna be a UNC-Ashville fan the rest of the day

wouldn't this be a great way to open the first day of the tournament?  I still think SU comes back to win, but who cares if they don't.

I think Syracuse finally got the memo that if they drive to the hole they will likely score or get FTs. Not sure what took them so long.

Holy shit is that bad plastic surgery. She is unrecognizable.

http://twitter.com/BryanDFischer/statuses/180387625562152962

First upset of the tournament: Wisconsin scores 73 points.

UNC Asheville is basically doing the same thing every time: pass it inside, draw the extra defender, kick it back out to the open shooter. Once Syracuse stops doubling down on the inside pass, UNC-A will probably find it harder to score, unless they have someone who can take his man 1 on 1 down low, which, I don't think so. Also, UNC-A's top 3 scorers each have 2 fouls. This game is going to be all Syracuse in the second half.

$3.99 has been totally worth it to be able to watch while I'm at work. 

I've been convinced for this entire basketball tournent season that I knew a girl who runs for UNC Asheville, when actually she runs for another UNC campus.

</semipersonalconnectiontothisgame>

What's sad to me is that Asheville isn't really playing all that well IMO. Turning the ball over alot, giving up offensive boards and fouling like quite a bit. Part of this is due to them just being completely overmatched athletically and in length. However, when they shoot the ball inside the 3 point line, they're knocking them down.

New Mexico and LBSU looks like its gonna be an offensive explosion lmao 

Love this quote from Grantland live NCAA blog...

Here's a tweet from @OtterVonBismark: March Madness needs more Celine Dion references. Who is the Titanic of the Midwest bracket?

Man, what an awesome Twitter handle. Great work, @OtterVonBismark. The unsinkable ship of the Midwest is, of course, UNC, while NC State is Leonardo DiCaprio and Kansas is Kate Hudson, who escapes. The Crimson Tide are the crazy poor people who party in the lower deck, Georgetown is the arrogant rich dude, and Michigan is the iceberg.

Asheville robbed of at least one point

Worst missed goal tending I have ever seen.

That was a huge three by UNC-Ashville. 

Tommy Amaker is down early to Vanderbilt.

Need one more run by Asheville but they're running out of steam...come on

 I refuse to acknowledge those early games as "Round One".  What a sham!!! 

I'm about to transfer to UNCA for psychology.  GO BULLDOGS.  Been living in Asheville for the past few years.

Still not over. It's a shame that Asheville seems to be getting the short end of the stick with some of the calls. Dickey got bodied on that missed layup, the missed goaltending gost them 2 points, and there were a couple fouls on the Bulldogs that I didn't think were warrented. Maybe I'm just looking through my underdog glasses. UNCA still had the opportunity to win this game.

NO 5 seconds?!

Another unlucky call against the Bulldogs!!!

Lane violation?!

Wow...this grey haired official is killing ashville every change he gets. This guys tourny should be down after this game. He is on Jim Burr levels at this point.

Wow.  Another bad call.  I think this ref has Syracuse in the final 4 in his bracket.

and a clear out of bounds off of the cuse missed....what a fucking joke

The lane violation was a lane violation.  The announcers are looking at the wrong guy.  But WTF was that out of bounds call?!?!?

FUCK these refs...FUCK them hard

So if UNC-Ashville loses I'm blaming it on the officiating. They fucking got hosed. 

The worst officiating I have ever seen in the Syracuse - UNC Asheville game.

Know there going to be a lot of bitter and angry people over those last calls which favored Cuse, but at least my bracket isn't busted 

Cuse was going to Elite Eight anyway, or at least the Sweet 16. 

Reggie Miller is PISSED. 

This is god-awful officiating.  I'm sorry it's bullshit and they know it themselves.  They're  aiding the advancing of the 1 seed.  Any other explanation?!

Absolutely stole an opportunity from Asheville. What a fucking disgrace.

UNCA just got royally screwed. Who knows what would have happened had the refs not made either bad call, much less both.

they may still have lost, but asheville got screwed by the officiating.

I don't give a fuck how it happened.

When did Keith Sergott start calling basketball games?

Rule 9.1.g:

Players not in a legal marked lane space shall remain behind the freethrow line extended and behind the three-point field-goal line until the ball strikes the ring, flange or backboard, or until the free throw ends.

He may have been behind the 3-point line when the ball left the shooter's hands but he was clearly beyond it when the ball struck the rim.

Outside of an almost/should have been upset by UNCA, this is the boringest tourney ever.  There have been literally no upsets, and most haven't been close.

Dullest thing to hear other people talk about:

a) their dreams (sleepy-time dreams, not goals-and-aspirations dreams)

b) their children / grandchildren

c) their fantasy teams

d) their brackets

And of, course, the correct answer:

e) all of the above are equally likely to induce severe zoning out

LBSU is down 4 with the ball with 53 seconds to go. Won't be easy, but they have a shot at an upset here.

Looks like Baylor needs RG3

Our old friend Kevin Pangos is showing WVU how it's done. Playing great for the Zags. Would have fit in great with our team and offense, but I'm happy with Burke.

but West Virginia is the suckiet bunch of sucks that ever sucked

What the fuck is Baylor wearing??

Well into the third quartet of games now and only one game is even single digits. There's an upset brewing, but a 12-over-5 featuring last year's Final Four team VCU winning by 11 is hardly  going to stop the presses. I guess I picked a good block of time to get some work done away from the TV... even if my phone is handy to stream anything interesting.