Judging from the teams that advanced to the Sweet Sixteen, it would appear that the NCAA Men’s Division I basketball tournament has gone pretty much according to the seedings. Only two teams remain that were higher than a 4 seed. One is Auburn, a 5 seed, and the other, to the pleasure of most of our local readers, is Oregon, a 12 seed that advanced by beating a 13 seed, the UC Irvine Anteaters. Not that I regret the prospect of seeing Oregon next weekend, but I would have enjoyed a week’s worth of human interest stories about the Anteaters.
The seedings of the Sweet Sixteen teams are a bit misleading, though, as an indicator of how the tournament has gone. Two of the number one seeds survived scares over the weekend. Virginia, who last year was famously the first team ever in the NCAA tournament to lost their first game to a 16 seed, nearly repeated their choke job, falling 14 points behind in the first half to Gardner-Webb, and only a furious comeback in the second half likely preserved their coach’s employment, never mind their survival in the tournament. The other close call happened to Duke, the favorite for many to win it all, who came within a last UCF shot rolling off the rim as time expired to going home and bidding adieu their future NBA #1 pick, Zach Williamson. The road to the Final Four looks pretty wide open for all of the teams that remain.
That includes Oregon, who draws Virginia in their next round and is playing, for all intents and purposes, with house money from this point forward. If the Ducks manage to get a lead on the Cavaliers, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the latter fold like a cheap suit. We shall see.
Charles’s Champion Bracket _ Tourney Pick’em _ Yahoo! Sports 2019
