March continues to drive students mad from MWSU Campus Watch on Vimeo.
For some basketball fanatics, March is the best month of the year. March Madness gives college basketball fans that one shining moment for their favorite team. The tournament is all about surviving to advance and has created many memorable moments. The miraculous comeback win by Stephen F. Austin and the six overtime games in the first round are continuing to make this year’s tournament something to remember.
This year, Warren Buffet, a billionaire investor offered a billion-dollar prize to whoever could create the perfect bracket. It has never been done before, but one student has made a great attempt.
“Right now I am in like the 98 percentile. I have done pretty well so far. My thought process was how many upsets I can pick and how bad can this bracket go. This one I thought would be the worst but it is in the 98 percentile,” Darin Young, sophomore in marketing, said.
When an upset occur, they often take place in the first weekend of the tournament. However there have been a few surprise teams in the past. Last year, Wichita State made a run at the Final Four as a 9 seed and in 2011 VCU made it to the final four as an 11 seed. But the lowest seed to win the tournament was eighth seeded Villanova in 1985. March Madness can be the greatest moment for a sports fan but also the worst.
“The N.C. State / Houston game was by far the worst experience of my childhood. It was the first time my mother heard me drop the F bomb. I was 13 years old and I threw things against the wall. I was pretty upset,” Wayne Schields, Assistant director of housing, said.
In the past 20 years, the final four has featured teams seeded lower than five only four times and a top seed has won the championship 15 of the last 20 tournaments. This tournament is known for surprises, but Cinderella’s dreams rarely come true.
“Traditionally if you have one of the higher seeds you are going to win the tournament. The tournament represents America,” Schields said. “We always want the lower seeds to eventually win. I think for any basketball fan if it came down to 10 seed vs a 1 seed in a championship game we are going for the 10 seed. We want to see the little guy win.”
This year’s tournament will wrap up on April 7 when the championship game takes place at AT&T stadium in Arlington, Texas.