Magnet Madness

Magnet+Madness

Matt Segler & Terrell Conner

March brings interesting weather and with it comes the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, popularly known as March Madness. It is arguably the most exciting tournament in sports, and it runs from Tuesday, Mar. 13 through Monday, Apr. 2.

Selection Sunday was on Sunday, Mar. 11. This is the day that all 64 teams are put into the brackets. The first 32 teams are automatic locks, which means that they have won their respective conference championships. The remaining 32 teams are called “at-large” bids. The tournament selection committee selects these teams based off their record and strength of schedule.

There are four different regions – South, West, East and Midwest. Each region has 16 teams seeded 1-16 from best to worst. The tournament is a single loss elimination, so teams need to be on their A game to keep the season going. This is a major reason why the tournament is known as March Madness, underdog teams also add to the madness. These underdog teams can also be referred to as bracket busters. Generally they are the teams that end up beating the favored seeded teams. Some of the most popular bracket busters in recent years are Florida Gulf Coast that was a 15 seed that ended up making it to the Sweet Sixteen, and Mercer when they knocked off the three seed Duke that was led by five future NBA players.

Magnet will be hosting its annual Magnet March Madness contest. Brackets are available  during lunch time. Turn brackets in to B 103 by Thursday, March 15 before the end of first hour. Any brackets submitted afterwards will not be accepted. Bragging rights t-shirts will be provided by Court Sports to the first, second, and third place winners.