The Bracketmaster

That's what they used to call me. I was a calculated risk taker, a college basketball genius or more likely an idiot savant as I wove myself into the history books of March Madness back in 2002 on that fateful selection Sunday as I filled out my brackets.
Many of us...ok many of us men...will be glued to the TV sets this afternoon as college basketball conference championship tournaments wrap up and as teams across the nation sit on the edge of their bubble waiting to hear their names called to know they made the big dance. March Madness got its name for a reason. Not only is it maddening for teams to try and figure out if they've made the NCAA tournament but also what seed they are going to get and what region they'll be shipped off to and eventually have to face a favored team on their home court...sorry a little Michigan St vs Iowa State flash back that is still a bitter pill to swallow slipped out there. But the tournament itself can also be madness as the little schools that could attempt to knock off the Goliaths of basketball. The Richmonds, Santa Claras, Coppin States and yes even the Hamptons of the world (a 2nd tough ISU pill to swallow) know that anything can happen if the ball bounces their way a few times. Some fo the greatest moments in sports history happen in the NCAA basketball tournament. Last second 3/4 court passes for turn around jumpers, length of the court dashes for lay ups and left handed free throws in honor of a lost team mate. There would be more of these moments had the shots fallen but we as a society generally remember the winning moments...the game winning shots. Unless you're a Cyclone fan then you remember the lay up that rimmed out. So basically if you love college basketball then you love the NCAA tournament unless your team has a history of not making it then you might love it even more because you are not emotionally invested.
But we all become emotionally invested when we fill out our brackets. Some of us may just enter the office pool for a buck or two and forget who we even picked and usually just take the highest seed if all else fails  because you weren't even aware Weber State or Sienna were even colleges let alone had basketball teams. Others get invited into pools by their buddies and end up entering one in their name, their wife's, brother's kid's and maybe even their dogs with as many scenarios they can think of with each having a different one of the favorites winning. Gotta cover all your bases. Some may have what is called a sheet of integrity and go with 1 outcome but could be entered into various pools. Others yet enter every free bracket challenge on the Internet...from ESPN to CBS Sportsline, Fox Sports, Sports Illustrated, Yahoo and Sportingnews. My apologizes to the several hundred others I left off as these were just a few of the ones I could remember my passwords for.

I fall into that last category if you hadn't figured it out. Mainly from what happened in 2002 as I'm trying to recapture the glory I obtained by winning the national Sportingnews.com bracket challenge. I got the 1099C to prove it as the computer I won has since died. I still remember calling my wife to tell her "dude we're getting a Dell". You remember those commercials right? My winning should have given me a free ticket to enter any fantasy sports or challenge for every sport imaginable but I guess someone forgot to tell my wife.

I remember entering a few times into this particular bracket challenge but there was 1 entry I was particularly proud of because I knew it'd be the one that no one else would enter; not even the Missouri fans had this much faith in their team. The way this challenge worked was what ever seed the team was given (1-16) got multiplied by the round they were playing in. So you basically get bonus points for picking the lower seeds winning...the higher number is the lower seed. I know it's backwards but that's the way it is. Here's how this all played out.

I had watched Missouri in the Big 12 throughout the year and had to put aside by disdain for Quinn Snyder and his used car salesman look because the team got hot in the conference tournament and I had a feeling they were going to make some noise. Then when they got the 12 seed I was beginning to question my gut feeling but I stuck with it after reading the rules on this bracket challenge. I almost picked the West region perfect. My only miss was UCLA upsetting Cincinnati which actually helped me out with Missouri then upsetting UCLA in the 3rd round (sweet 16). This was after Missouri had upset Miami in the 1st round and then Ohio State in the 2nd round only to fall to Oklahoma losing out on a chance to go to the Final 4. So I nailed 3 of the 4 Final 4 teams and I was thinking this is cool I'm in the top 1%. I remember hearing an interview on the local sports radio of a college kid at ISU that was in 1st going into the sweet 16 and he ended up tanking the 2nd half...that's what you get for being a Duke fan I guess which is why I always have them losing at some point. Most people had Kansas, Duke or Cincinnati winning it all that year. But in that championship game I was a Terp

During the game I figured I'd check the rankings and see how everyone was sitting. I got through the 1st couple pages of standings and none of them had Maryland winning the championship so I began to think I might have my best finish ever. Then after what was an extremely low scoring game I started looking even closer. I didn't think it could be right but it was looking like I was going to finish 2nd in the country. I stayed up for hours checking and double checking the math. How much longer till it updated? Finally there it was for all the world to see I finished 2nd in the country. But then later that day I got an email informing me I would be bumped to the top spot because the winner was not of age so was disqualified. So even though it was by default I had won. I remember even trying to tell them I would be leaving on vacation to get them to send me the forms I had to fill out earlier but nope they sent it as they had planned. We got a ton of use out of that Dell and upgraded video cards several times....we still actually use the monitor on our new computer today.

Unfortunately I have been unable to capture the success I did during that fateful run of the tournament and I continually tank it before the sweet 16 is up. Don't get me wrong; since then I have picked a perfect region every year but it's the other 3 that tend to give me problems.
Sorry I gotta cut this short all the Bracketology shows are on and then it's time to enter as many tournament challenges as I can.