RECAPPING A WILD FIRST WEEKEND OF MARCH MADNESS

NBA / Basketball

Written by Eddie Huband

In the blink of an eye, we’ve already gone from 64 teams down to 16, as an eventful first weekend in March Madness has come and gone.

There’s been a ton of intriguing moments, some surprising, and some not so much. So let’s go through the biggest storylines from the first two rounds.

Source (Background Photo): Getty Images

Surprised

There were a lot of popular picks to be Cinderella teams this year, but the St. Peters Peacocks definitely wasn’t one of them. Their run to the Sweet Sixteen has been without a doubt the biggest surprise of the tournament.

After a shocking upset over #2 seed Kentucky in round one, the first tournament wins ever in program history, the plucky (no pun intended) #15 seed followed it up with a convincing double-digit victory over Murray State.

They’ve been getting help from a lot of sources; guard Daryl Banks III had 27 points in round one, while forward KC Ndefo has was outstanding with a double-double in round two. The real story though has been the play of reserve sniper Doug Edert.

Edert, along with his glorious mustache, has taken the nation by storm, and he’s somehow become Vinnie Johnson 2.0 since the tournament began. He had 20 points in 25 minutes in the Kentucky win.

At this point, the Peacocks have all the confidence in the world, which is what you want in March Madness. Get a couple of wins under your belt and all of a sudden you feel like you can beat anyone.

Time will tell how long the run will last.

Though there have been some great games over the course of the first four days of the tournament, it’s a bit surprising that there hasn’t been a ton of crazy late-game signature moments compared to previous years.

There hasn’t been a game-winning buzzer-beater yet, which seems a tad odd. In general, it feels like there’s been a bit of a lack of crazy finishes as well.

Still, there has been a couple of super entertaining overtime games. The best game of the tournament so far was a thriller in the second round between UNC and Baylor, with the defending champs staging a miracle comeback down 25 points in the second half to force OT, only to run out of gas in the extra frame.

This game was awesome, as were several others, but we still got that crazy finish that we’ve become so accustomed to from the early rounds. Hopefully, more of those moments will come over the next few weeks.

Not surprised

That three of the four #1 seeds (Gonzaga, Kansas, and Arizona) are still around.

The idea that March Madness is all upsets and Cinderella stories is a major misconception, mainly because those are the moments that stand out in memory the most.

In actual fact, higher seeds win a majority of the time. In the last 15 tournaments, a #1 seed has won it all 11 times. The lowest seed to win over that span was the #7 seeded UCONN Huskies in 2014. The point is, the good teams usually go far. Go figure.

So the fact that Arizona, Gonzaga, and Kansas are all still dancing isn’t a surprise. Though it should be noted that it hasn’t been easy for either of them.

After flirting with disaster in the first round, the Zags survived another scare to the #9 seeded Memphis Tigers in the second round, finishing them off by just four points to secure their Sweet Sixteen bid.

Potential #1 pick Chet Holmgren had just 9 points in 29 minutes in that one. He’ll need to be better if Gonzaga wants to return to the title game for the second straight season.

Arizona meanwhile also barely scraped by a #9 seed in round two, with a 5 point win over TCU. This team is great production mind you from guard Bennedict Mathurin who dropped 30 in the win.

Arizona is a team with some straight-up dogs on the defensive end, which bodes well in them in later rounds. From here on out, nothing is going to be easy though.

Kansas has made it to the Sweet Sixteen relatively unscathed, but their lack of potency in the frontcourt coupled with a tough upcoming matchup against the red-hot Providence Friars leads me to believe they're the least trustworthy of the remaining #1 seeds.

We’ll see how it all shakes down next weekend.

I’m also not surprised that there were zero perfect brackets left after just the first round of the tournament. You can thank those beautiful peacocks of St. Peters for that.

Some might be surprised that it took just two days and 36 games to mess up literally every bracket on earth, but not me.

No matter how many times we tell ourselves that this year will be different, March Madness is an exercise in futility, I don’t care how much you know about NCAA sports.

Updated finals predictions

Well, my original pick of Duke beating Auburn in the finals came crashing down when the Tigers inexplicably got blown out in round two. I might as well continue to ride the Blue Devils, who have looked pretty much the part of a title contender actually.

On the other side, I’ll go with Arizona to make the finals, and lose to Duke.