My Crappy NCAA Tournament Picks: Day 3

 

Ohio St is a bunch of lucky asses: Justin Cage misses a FT that would’ve made it a 2 possession game down the stretch and put it out of hand, instead, Ohio St. gets the ball back and Ron Lewis nails a 3ptr and the rest is history. Credit where it’s due however; without Oden the Buckeyes blew away Xavier in OT – Conley Jr. was a stud scoring 11 pts.

Free Throws are Key: Ohio St. was allowed the opportunity to tie it because Cage went 1 of 2 in the last few seconds. UCLA held off Indiana because Afflalo made 2 of 2 with the game tied at 49, and Collison went 2 of 2 making it a two possession game. Edgar Sosa was 15 of 15 for Louisville but missed two with 30 seconds left and his team down by 1. Levance Fields missed two FT’s with a few seconds left and the game tied at 69 for Pitt. If he made one of them, odds are Pitt wouldn’t had to go to OT with VCU.

Every Game was Close: There wasn’t one that wasn’t interesting! Almost all of the games were tight for at least 37 of the 40 minutes. The ones that weren’t at least involved a few good runs that made the games tight. Pitt dominated VCU most of the way, but they blew a 19 point lead that sent it to OT. UCLA blew a 16 point lead that made it close in the end. Even North Carolina struggled with Michigan St. for the first 36 minutes before pulling away. Meaning…

There’s No Way to Rank the Conferences: All of the games were so close that there’s no possible way to say that conference A is tougher than conference B and conference C. These games only prove how difficult all of the major conferences are (Big Ten, ACC, Big East, Pac-10, SEC, Big 12) and how competitive the top teams are. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise; each conference played the opposing conference closely. A three point win for A&M over Louisville only means these teams are pretty evenly matched, same with Vanderbilt and Washington St., as well as Georgetown and BC.

CBS Gets Their Wish: After pairing UCLA and Pitt in the same bracket for the second year in a row, they will finally get their wish. Howland vs. Dixon, mentor vs. mentee, coach vs. former assistant. I’ll discontinue this thread — you’ll get enough of it over the next week.

Here are what my crappy NCAA picks look like after three days

MIDWEST REGION

WEST REGION