Happy Hour 03/12: Read This Now, and Believe Me Later

Okay, my friends. It's tournament time. March Madness. The Big Dance. Cinderellas, Sweet Sixteens, Elite Eights, Final Fours, and Shining Moments. Quite possibly the most wonderful time of the year.

Yep. I don't know anything about it.

When I got home last night, I tried to watch the selection specials that I DVR'ed, but after about 10 minutes, I realized I hardly knew a damn thing about any of these schools. And right then, a small part of me cried because it occurred to me that I may have been a more knowledgeable sports fan in my teens and twenties. I would've been all over this thing 10-12 years ago.

Even back in high school, I knew so much more about college basketball than I do now. I actually took the time to watch other conferences play. This past weekend, I actually reminisced about how I used to set aside time on a Saturday or Sunday to watch an important Big East or ACC match-up. Nowadays, with the exception of a handful of SEC games this year (which probably involved either Florida or Tennessee), it's been quite a while since I watched a regular season game that didn't involve a Big Ten team.

Despite what I just confessed in the previous two paragraphs, however, I'm going to make some NCAA tournament predictions anyway. And you might just want to read this post through to the end. Wanna know why? Do you wanna know? Because last year, I won the Super Blogger Tournament Challenge Extravaganza.

Yeah, that's right. When it was all over, I barely beat crushed Complete Sports by one point to take the trophy that doesn't really exist I still drink ice-cold beer out of one year later. And after I wipe off my chin, I look at my reflection in the silver and laugh at how totally #@$%ing lucky I was awesome that victory was.

Essentially, I was the sports blog equivalent of the secretary winning the office pool.

So here's what I'm going to do: I'm not going through the entire bracket. Tony Kornheiser did that with a handful of experts on his radio show this morning, and after one or two repetitions of the bracket, I opted for my iPod. If I couldn't stand listening to it, I don't know how in the hell I can write it all out. Especially when you can find several dozen people in the blogosphere who know what the #@$% they're talking about. What I will write out are my first-round upsets and my Final Four picks. 'Cuz that's what the big boys like Dan Shanoff do (except a full nine hours earlier).

First-round upset winners:
Davidson, Georgia Tech, VCU, Gonzaga, and Creighton.

You might notice Michigan State isn't on that list. I couldn't pick the Spartans, as much as I wanted to. (Besides, is picking a #9 seed over a #8 really picking an upset?) Unless Tom Izzo pumps up his kids by taking them to a showing of 300 the day before the game, and/or kicks his old buddy Tom Crean into the deepest, darkest well in Winston-Salem after screaming "THIS IS SPARTA!" MSU ain't beatin' Marquette. Sorry, Sparty. (That movie totally kicked ass, by the way.)

Final Four:
Florida, UCLA, Georgetown, and Tennessee.

Yeah, that's right- Tennessee. Either my sister's fiancee (Yes, Dr. Lil' Sis' boyfriend proposed to her last week. We're all happy about it - thanks for asking) has completely corrupted my objective opinion, I've been mystified by bare-chested coaches who paint themselves orange, or I might just have one of those hunches.

Did I mention that I won my bracket contest last year? You might want to take this post very seriously, my friends. I'm kind of a big deal with this stuff.

EDIT (03/13): I didn't pick an overall winner, did I? I really should do that. But it's a boring pick, which is probably why I forgot to post it originally. I have Georgetown and Florida in the finals, with the Gators repeating as national champions.