That concludes our coverage of the first round of the NCAA Tournament. Thank you for joining us! Best of luck to all the college basketball fans whose teams are still dancing. Congratulations to UVA for avoiding an unthinkable calamity. I must say, judging by this blog, the women’s tourney brought the excitement today. No real shockers on the men’s side — we weren’t shocked by your win, Anteaters!
Bring on Zion in approximately 20 minutes.
And neither of my teams has yet to play! Should be a good weekend. 🤞
The UConn 2-seed revenge tour starts tonight.
We have a 12-vs.-13 matchup in the second round! We give Oregon a 69 percent chance of beating the Anteaters.
If not for that last 3-pointer, that would have been the most lopsided 12-5 upset in the history of the tournament. At 72-54, it ended up being the third-most lopsided. Murray State by 19 over Marquette last night was second. (Still No. 1 is Eastern Michigan 76, Mississippi State 56, in 1991.)
Badger here, off to cure my disappointment through lots and lots of cheese 🧀
Tough ending for Ethan Happ. He was 5-for-10. The rest of his team was 14-for-49.
Death, taxes and 12-5 upsets. Sorry, Badger nation.
After 139 career starts and more than 4,000 minutes played, that’ll do it for Ethan Happ’s college career. Seems like it was just 20 years ago that a young Ethan first arrived on campus in Madison. And indeed it was.
Of the FiveThirtyEight model’s favorite double-digit seed upset picks (>30 percent odds): Florida won; Oregon will win; Seton Hall lost; Murray State won; Ohio State — we’ll see; Iowa won; Minnesota lost.
Oregon on a 16-2 run. Ooof, Badgers.
And the Buffalo men finished their business, too.
While that dramatic ending to Drake vs Mizzou was happening, the No. 10 Buffalo upset of No. 7 Rutgers did actually happen. So, brush your shoulders off I guess, FiveThirtyEight.
Meanwhile, Oregon has pulled ahead by 14 against the Badgers.
Another good look. Seems like teams have really been drawing up perfect plays in last-second timeouts, just not hitting the shots.
What an ending!
Drake’s shot is just barely off, and Mizzou moves on.
Is there VAR in college basketball?
She rattles home the second, misses the third. There are still 1.1 seconds left.
Well…
So much for double-OT. Would take three straight missed FTs.
Started from the bottom…..now we’re here. (I’m sorry)
OMG
DON’T CALL THAT FOUL
And the squiggly lines in that chart!
After the made FT, Drake and Mizzou tied again with 15.9 seconds left in OT No. 1.
(I’m kinda assuming it goes to double OT.)
Look at that excitement index!
By far the craziest chart of this tournament thus far:
YESSSSSS
Just popping in to say that since we had Drake as the underdog, if they win, you could say they:
With Arizona State’s imminent loss, the streak of First Four teams winning at least one game in the proper tournament will likely come to an end. North Dakota State would have to beat Duke to keep the streak alive … so … yeah, it’s dead.
Today’s two Buffalo games look like they’ll end at roughly the same time. Though the men’s game has been over for a while — the Bulls are up by 19 on Arizona State. But the women are locked in a pithed battle with Rutgers — the Bills are up 3 with three minutes left.
Ethan Happ just went barreling into the Wisconsin bench to save a ball, then got back in and made a great post spin to draw a foul.
All of the FiveThirtyEight watchers just exclaimed together, “OHHHHHH!”
We’re going to overtime in Greensboro!
Mizzou will have to go the entire length of the floor in 2.5 seconds, so it will either be a classic “One Shining Moment” or OT.
This is madness. Two free throws tie it for Missouri. And then a steal on one end and a block on another and another block on the other and it’s still tied. 2.5 seconds left.
DON’T PICK UP YOUR DRIBBLE, DRAKE PLAYER.
The tiger stripes on the side of these Mizzou uniforms are 🔥
One close game in the women’s tournament just ended, and another one is coming down to the wire.
Oregon has also been setting up a bunch of lob slams for Kenny Wooten in this half so far.
Point guard Payton Pritchard has been absolutely carrying Oregon during the Ducks’ run. In the final three games of the Pac-12 tourney, he had 20, 18 and 20 points and 5, 8 and 7 assists. He has a great handle and can get to the basket himself or drive and kick.
Day 1 of women’s tournament > Day 1 of men’s tournament — and it’s not really that close.
Another super-exciting game!
Bucknell with two chances to send the game to overtime but couldn’t convert. FSU holds on to win 70-67.
Great inbound play from Bucknell cuts the lead to 2. 14.6 seconds left. FSU ball.
Oregon and Wisconsin trading threes and dunks in this second half. Is it possible this game might get … exciting???
Bucknell women with some great defense but failed to get the rebound. Florida State grabs its 20th offensive rebound of the game. Four-point FSU lead, 22 seconds left.
Hard to watch the two games in Tulsa and not think Buffalo has been more impressive than Texas Tech ahead of a likely second-round matchup. Texas Tech had 109.3 adjusted offensive efficiency, 102.4 adjusted defensive efficiency vs. Northern Kentucky, via KenPom. Buffalo cruising, shooting 52 percent, limiting Arizona State to 1-for-14 from the 3-point line.