ANTHONY GETTINO
Special to The Leader
What a horrible start.
The first two rounds of the tournament are over. There were no buzzer beaters, no amazing comeback victories, and no 16 seeds beating Virginia.
I was thoroughly unimpressed.
My bracket is done. I had Syracuse beating Baylor and Gonzaga. That was disappointing to say the least. Nevada to the Final Four was a pick that was probably a little too crazy, but a first round exit?
Though, there was one fun piece of the bracket.
The 12 seed Oregon beating Wisconsin and the 13 seeded UC Irvine beating Kansas State and playing one another for not only a trip to the Sweet 16, but for the title of the best program from the West Coast of all time.
I’m not saying that there haven’t been games that were fun and exciting to watch. There have been.
LSU has been a part of two of my top three games so far. The game against Yale were fun because Yale couldn’t miss from three point range the last 7 minutes and almost came back from a 20 point deficit. Tremont Waters is also the most clutch player in this tournament hands down. His game winning layup against Maryland was a thing of beauty.
My favorite game so far was the highly anticipated matchup of the two juggernauts, Zion Williamson and the number one overall seeded Duke Blue Devils against the nine seed UCF Knights and the man who can stand on his knees and be the size of college basketball players, 7’6” Tacko Fall.
That game had the makeup to be a championship game in my eyes. Tacko Fall is the only man tall enough in this tournament to stop Zion Williamson from getting to the rack by just putting his hands up and being able to be above the rim. That’s why UCF lost by one point. Tacko fouled out with 14 seconds left, which left him out of the game for UCF’s final offensive possession. Had he been in for the final tip in chance, that’s no tip in; it’s maybe the first game winning slam dunk without the player leaving the ground.
The West bracket has the 1,2,3 and 4 seeds left, as does the East. The Midwest has the 1,2,3 and 5, and the South has the 1,2,3 and 12. This season of college basketball has been very top heavy, with the Big 3 of ACC schools North Carolina, Virginia and Duke going back and forth as the best team in basketball, with Gonzaga not far behind as well as Tennessee. There’s a reason those five schools are still in the tourney. They are just flat out better than the competition, no matter how much Iowa wanted to disagree.
I’m gonna put in my picks now, and I wanna be on the record saying that these will more likely than not be 100% wrong. That’s just March Madness.
Elite Eight: Duke vs LSU in the East, Gonzaga vs Texas Tech in the West, Virginia vs Tennessee in the South and North Carolina vs Kentucky in the Midwest.
Final Four: LSU vs Gonzaga and Tennessee vs North Carolina.
My reasoning for this is that there are only two teams in this entire tournament that can actually beat Duke with the roster’s they have, and they are LSU and North Carolina. I picked LSU because of the dislike I have for Duke and the fact that they shoot the ball well from all over, especially the free throw line, and they have that clutch gene in their leader Tremont Waters that I did not see anyone from Duke having against UCF. If that game is close, LSU is dancing.
Gonzaga is not a very strong one seed, but they got a pretty easy road to the Final Four. Florida State and Texas Tech will give them trouble, but they don’t have either a star player (FLorida State) or they do not have the overall offensive firepower besides their star (Texas Tech) to beat out Gonzaga.
Tennessee got lucky they were in the same bracket as Virginia. Virginia plays so slow that they are their own worst enemy in this style of bracket. They have the easiest road to the Elite Eight I’ve ever been alive for and will still mess up their best chance at a title. They were losing to a 16 seed at half, then kept a team with an under .500 record in conference play keep the game within striking distance the whole time, and now get to face a 12 seed in the Sweet 16. Tennessee will knock their socks off if they don’t go in and play perfectly.
North Carolina is the safest pick I made. They play fast and shoot well from the outside. They should be the favorite from this point to win it all. Coby White is a stud, and they have big athletic guys in the front court that rebound very well on both sides of the court.