March Madness

One of the most popular sporting events in the United States is Men’s Basketball College NCAA tournament also known as March Madness. The reason it is called March Madness there is a field of sixty-four teams going for the title and if your team loses than you are out of the tournament.  Starting today there will be four games with eight teams vying to get into the tournament which starts on Thursday March 19. One of the teams winning today will have to face the overall number one seed Kentucky in the first round of the tournament. There are a total of four regions with sixteen teams in each region. The number sixteen seed plays the number one see in the first round. A number sixteen seed has never beaten a number one seed though there have been a few close calls over the years.

Going into this tournament Kentucky has won all thirty-four games this season and is a big favorite to win the tournament; however, like all teams they know that they can’t afford to play a bad game and lose even one game to win the tournament. The last time an undefeated team won the tournament was Indiana in 1976.

The other number one seeded teams in the tournament are Wisconsin, Villanova, and Duke. Besides the fact teams must continue to win to stay in the tournament there are always several upsets. It not only applies in the first round it also happens in the other rounds as well. Though a first seed has never lost in the first round there have been other top seeds that have lost in the first round which what makes the tournament so exciting.

Every conference in the NCAA have what is called an automatic bid in which a minimum of one team plays in the tournament. The automatic bid comes out of each conference’s tournament. There is a panel in the NCAA that picks the remaining teams to play in the tournament. This is what makes the tournament exciting as well you see smaller colleges in the tournament you likely would not see otherwise.  For example, out of the Ivy League you have Harvard which is a thirteen seed that will play North Carolina a number four seed in the first round. Though a thirteen seed most likely will not win the first round the upset win is always possible. Teams like Harvard will be the only team from their conference in the tournament. The larger conferences will have several teams in the tournament. The amount of teams from a conference will depend each year how well the teams in those conferences play. There has been a few times in Pac-12 conference where only the winner of the conference tournament gets in being an automatic bid while other years they have had at least four teams get into the tournament. A conference like the Big East has often got up to seven or eight teams into the tournament.

At the end of this weekend the field will narrow down to what is called the sweet sixteen after two rounds. Next weekend it will than go to the final four; and the following weekend the semi-finals on the Saturday and the final on the Monday April 6 in Tampa Bay, Florida.

Another thing that makes this tournament exciting is that a lot of people fill out brackets of the tournament to see who wins. Often sites like ESPN will have prizes for the person who picks the best in the tournament.  It is a good way to stay interested in the tournament along with following your favorite team. All the games will be shown on television as well. They will be shown on several cable channels as well as CBS. So everyone enjoy the tournament and hopefully your favorite team will win.