How to Create a Winning Bracket - Help, Do you Know?

Each year, along with a million-gazillion of my closest friends, I fill out a bracket for the Men's NCAA Tournament. This exercise is usually followed by extreme exasperation as my bracket that was once filled with hope and promise falls apart before my eyes. It is especially painful when a team that I am truly rooting for (Duke or IU) is the one that it because that is personal. Ironically my best bracket ever was not submitted into a pool of any kind, so I do not have proof of my domination. Oh well it will live on forever, even if it is only in my own mind.

 

In my humble opinion, this year's tournament is going to be especially hard to predict. Throughout this whole season there has never been that team who has come out as a clear favorite to cut down the nets in Atlanta on April 8. For me, this tournament is filled with teams who have wreaked havoc on my brackets in the past (e.g. Georgetown, Kansas, Gonzaga, VCU, among others). After a lifetime (sadly, soon to be 31 years) of watching college basketball, one would think I would have a solid strategy by now. Not even remotely the case. While I like to think I have "grown" in my strategy by being more realistic, such as no longer picking Duke to win the championship every year just because that is what I want to happen, I still have no idea what I am doing half the time. At times I think my knowledge (or lack thereof on a given team or a whole conference) can cause me to over think a game. I can talk myself into or out of just about any scenario. I wish I could be one of "those" people who picks a team because they like the mascot or the team colors or the coach wears too much gel in his hair thereby making him appear slick and sly (Rick Pitino, I am talking to you bud).

 

Then there are those sleeper teams that scare me, the teams that get hot at just the right time and cause just enough doubt in your mind... Those teams seem to be on the number two line this year - Miami and Ohio State are jumping out in that category, although the evil UNC could cause some trouble this year as they came on strong at the finish, especially in the ACC Tournament.

 

Then there are my personal, often unfounded biases that may cause me to make an errant decision. For instance, I am still angry at Missouri for blowing up my bracket last year; thus, I will not give them too much power this season. Or the fact that I think Billy Donovan (Florida head coach) is sly, and Joakim Noah (of their back-to-back championships) was incorrigible, so I cannot allow Florida to advance too far in my tournament scenario. Even sillier than that - I struggle with the consistently, dirty play of the University of Cincinnati and their poor graduation rates; so they are hard to root for, regardless of their play in a given year. One more example, this past off-season I lost all respect for Bo Ryan the head coach for the University of Wisconsin after he created a list of schools in which a recruit could not transfer to because he did not want to have him be a threat for his opponent - therefore Wisconsin, you will see an early exit from my bracket. Plus the Badgers seem to have Indiana's number when they face off - so let's just eliminate that threat.

 

Finally, this year an especially big struggle is picking "when, not if" my beloved Duke Blue Devils are going out this year. I trust they can get past Albany, but Creighton or Cincinnati (grrr, see above) could be a tough match-up, especially since the Blue Devils looked exhausted in the ACC Tournament. Let's hope this is not another Lehigh situation of 2012. While it is bad enough that Duke went out in the second round, but for the life of me I still do not even know where Lehigh is located!

 

Enough talking, time to fill out my bracket. After which, I will go home and watch the selection show so I do not let the talking heads confuse me. I want to try a new approach of picking my bracket all on my own then seeing how it matches up with the "experts." Except Digger Phelps, he drives me bonkers and wears bad ties, yep there are those unfounded biases again.

All I do know is that I am standing with President Obama -

INDIANA HOOSIERS, 2013 NATIONAL CHAMPIONS!

If you have any tips, please feel free to send them along...