March Madness is a tournament among the top 68 college basketball teams in the country, famous for its bracket system that prompts competition with friends, families, and peers. Within the tournament, there are four conferences, and the winner of each conference battles it out with the other three teams for the championship. There are 16 teams in each division. March Madness serves as the post season for college basketball; the teams that don’t make it into March Madness join another tournament that typically receives less media coverage.
March Madness is known for bringing about a wealth of predictions on the final bracket, in addition to shocking endings and upsets. To start, the eight lowest-ranked teams play each other and the winners move on to the next stage, referred to as the “First Four.” Then, the first round with all the teams begins. The #1 seed plays #16, #2 faces #15, and so on until a winner for each match has been determined. Each winning seed moves on to the next round, nicknamed the “Sweet 16.” The next round is called the “Elite Eight,” which is followed by the “Final Four” before, finally, the championship match is played.
Over the years, there have been some major upsets. An upset takes place when the underdog wins a game against a team with a strong reputation, like if the #16 seed beat the #1 seed in the first game. There is also a term used in tournaments to describe a bad team getting really far in the tournament: a Cinderella Run. A 10 seed or lower making it far in the tournament is considered a Cinderella Run. Back in 1985, the #8 seed Villanova Wildcats went on a Cinderella Run to win the tournament. Another example is Saint Peter’s reaching the Elite Eight as a #15 seed.
Michigan, Duke, Arizona, and Florida are the four number one seeds. However just because they are number one does not mean there are no other good teams. Houston, UConn, Purdue, and Iowa State closely follow them with all of the two seeds. Right before the tournament there are conference tournaments. Teams in each conference battle it out to see who is the best. The conference tourneys don’t usually affect the teams that lose. However the teams that win will usually get a small boost in their ranking. Only Duke, and Arizona won their tournament. What does this mean? Who will win? Will there be a major upset? Are all the one seeds just going to dominate? Who knows, this is March Madness.
