March Madness 2017

Joseph Espy, Reporter

March has rolled around again bringing one of the most exciting events in sports, the NCAA Tournament. The 64-team tournament known for its upsets has been unique this year so far.

The first round saw nearly all of the favored seeds take care of business. The few upsets that did happen in the opening round were very predictable. 12th seed Middle Tennessee State over 5th seed Minnesota, 11th seed Xavier over 6th seed Maryland, and 11th seed Rhode Island over 6th seed Creighton were all favorable matchups for the lower seeds to pull off according to multiple bracketologists including Joe Lunardi.

The second round of the tournament provided the upsets and close games fans have been accustomed to seeing in past years. Cinderella stories continued to develop as 7th seed Michigan and 11th seed Xavier both advanced to the sweet 16 with upset wins over 2nd seed Louisville and 3rd seed Florida State respectively.

One of the favorites to win the tournament, 2nd seed Duke, was shocked in the second round by 7th seed South Carolina. After leading comfortably for the whole first half. The young and talented Blue Devils were stifled by the Gamecocks stingy defense in the second half resulting in an 88-81 win for South Carolina.

The defending champions Villanova, were also sent home early courtesy of another Big Ten team in 8th seeded Wisconsin. The Badgers held a slight lead throughout the contest and pulled away late with a late bucket en route to a 65-62 upset victory.

With the ACC struggling, the Big Ten, SEC, and Pac-12 conferences have all capitalized sending multiple teams to the Sweet 16 setting up for an exciting second week.