First Round Recap

CBS commentator Clark Kellogg said Thursday before the first tip 'This year you can throw out all the numbers and all the seedings; anybody can win any game.'  I thought to myself 'Clark is right to a certain extent, but some upsets just can't happen.'  They did and of course I'm on the bottom, or near the bottom, of every pool I'm in.  A look at all the first round games region by region.

 Will Franklin and Bradley upset a solid, but young, Kansas team Friday night in Auburn Hills.

Atlanta

     Duke got a run into the second half vs Southern, then pulled away; George Washington was down by 17, but rallied in the second half to beat UNC-Wilmington.  Nice draw.  GW goes 26-2, gets an EIGHT seed which is completely ridiculous then has to play a team from North Carolina in Greensboro, N.C.  Yeah, that's fair; Texas A&M beat Syracuse 66-58.  Gerry McNamara had his worst day in his last game for the Orange going 0-13 from the field (including 0-6 from behind the arc).  He hasn't been healthy for a while and a rumor is floating that he's been playing with a hernia for lord knows how long; LSU slid by Iona.  Iona, up by 5 at the half, but Baby Shaq, Glen Davis, scored 22 points and had 13 rebounds for the Tigers; West Virginia completely dominated Southern Illinois in somewhat of a surprise.  The Salukis were returning four of five starters from last years NCAA tourney team; Northwestern State beat Iowa, 64-63 on a three at the buzzer by Jermaine Wallace.  Best finish to a game so far this year; North Carolina State trailed Cal most of the game until another three in the final seconds gave the Wolfpack the win over Leon Powe and the Bears; Texas beat the Quakers of Penn in a tight game, 60-52.

 Greg Brunner and Iowa blew a 17-point second half lead vs Northwestern State and lost at the buzzer.

Oakland

     Memphis took over late to beat a tough 16 seed in Oral Roberts, 94-78.  Rodney Carney scored 19 in the win; Bucknell is looking tough again this year taking out Arkansas in the first round; Pittsburgh completely trounced Kent State; Bradley beat Kansas (more on this game below); San Diego State completely dominated Indiana yet lost on a three with ten seconds left by the Hoosiers Robert Vaden; Gonzaga needed a great finish by Adam Morrison to nix Xavier's chance for an upset.  Gonzaga wins 79-75; Alabama beat Marquette, 90-85, after a late Steve Novak three was just off; UCLA whipped the living snot out of Belmont, 78-44.  That school should get rid of basketball all together.

Washington

     UConn was down by 10 with 12 minutes to go, but fought back to take out Albany.  Talk about a scary site looking at the screen and seeing 'Albany 53, UConn 43.'  Whew.  Praise the Lord that upset didn't happen; Kentucky defeated a tough UAB team.  UAB proved it belonged with a strong showing just losing by 5, 69-64; Washington beat Utah State in a game I'm sure nobody East of the Mississippi watched; Illinois beat Air Force in another game a team who was told they shouldn't have been playing in (AF) proved it belonged; George Mason upset Michigan State (more about this game below also); North Carolina struggled past Murray State, 69-95 behind Tyler Hansbrough's 24 points and 8 rebounds; Wichita State slaughtered Seton Hall 86-66; Tennessee needed a long two from Chris Lofton with 0.4 seconds left to beat Winthrop, 63-61.

Minneapolis

     Villanova moved past Monmouth; Arizona moved out to a 35-11 lead in the first half and held off a strong second half by Wisconsin.  Right.  Wisconsin put up no fight what so ever; Montana upset Nevada 87-79 on Andrew Straits 22 points.  The Grizzlies never trailed and now will face Boston College, who upended Pacific 88-76 in double overtime.  Senior Craig Smith scored 25 points and had 13 rebounds; UW-Milwaukee got off to another strong start after their Sweet Sixteen run from a year ago beating Oklahoma 82-74.  UW-Milwaukee will now face Florida who ran over South Alabama 76-50; Georgetown squeaked by Northern Iowa on Friday to set up a great second round game vs Ohio State.  The Buckeyes also survived a tough game, ending Davidson's upset bid, 70-62.

Odd's and End's

*  Why exactly was everybody picking Kansas to go to the Final Four?  Yes, the Jayhawk's won the Big 12 Championship, but they start three freshman and two sophomores.  Isn't it a given you need upperclassmen in the backcourt to move on in the tourney?  I picked the Jayhawk's to go to the Elite Eight.  I need to be quiet.

*  Michigan State was completely awful late vs George Mason.  The Spartans have a solid inside presence in Paul Davis who could have gotten them a ton of points down low and all the Spartans did was throw up 3's in the final minutes not making any.

*  CBS was talking a bit much about George Mason's Tony Skin.  If you don't remember, Skin punched a Hofstra player below the belt last weekend and was suspended for this first round game.  'Tony will get to play another game,' the commentator was saying.  First of all, they shouldn't be mentioning his name at all after what he did.  Second, he shouldn't be playing again period.

*  UConn point guard Marcus Williams was absolutely fantastic in the second half vs Albany scoring 14 points after the break to help the Huskies come back from a ten point second half deficit.

*  San Diego State completely ruined a chance for a nice upset Thursday night.  They had a good 5-7 point lead throughout the second half until turnover after turnover and bad shot after bad shot left Indiana with a three at the end to win it.  The Hoosiers' Robert Vaden hit the go-ahead three with 3.3 seconds left to send the Aztecs home.

*  Think about this:  Syracuse won the Big East tourney, Kansas won the Big 12 tourney and Iowa won the Big Ten tourney.  All three are heading home after the first round.  Incredible.