Sadly, March and its madness have ended. The conclusion of the basketball season does, however, mean that we can crown the winner of the 2013 CU Independent Bracket Challenge.
We had three contestants tie for first place: Nate Silver, branhoff2 and Alex77814. Contact the CU Independent at tips@cuindependent.com to claim your prize.
Sports Editor Jillian Arja
This 2013 NCAA tournament had many Cinderella moments and surprises. Only 47 out of the millions of ESPN applicants chose the correct Final Four, which proves how unanticipated some of the results were, even to basketball fanatics.
Considering I had no teams left in my bracket going into the last four games, I would say that I made some poor decisions for my 2013 NCAA bracket. Duke, Gonzaga, Florida and Indiana were in my ideal Final Four, with Florida as my NCAA champion. In reality, Duke and Florida made it to the Elite Eight before losing to No. 1 Louisville and Michigan respectively. Indiana made it to the Sweet 16 before losing to Syracuse 61-50. Pathetically, Gonzaga lost in the second round to Wichita State. No. 9 Wichita State, however, made it to the Final Four and pitted against Louisville.
Sports Editor Scott Annis
I started off very quickly in the bracket challenge and found myself in first place after the first and second rounds in the CU Independent Bracket Challenge. Of course I missed on some of the big upsets, but I also got both Cal and Oregon. After the first couple of rounds, however, things started to go downhill. Maybe I was smack-talking to much.
I had Duke and Indiana in the finals and both lost in the Elite Eight. I thought New Mexico would be the surprise team and make it to the final four, but oh was I wrong. After losing to Harvard, Wichita State took over as the surprise team. I finished in 32nd place in the challenge. I didn’t think Louisville would win and it upsets me a little bit that the overall favorite won it all. This is supposed to be March Madness but it ended in chalk. I guess there is always next year.
Reporter Alissa Noe
After the first weekend of the tournament, I never thought I would do as well in my pools as I did. I made some stupid picks in the first round and that, along with numerous upsets, put me in a tight spot. The entire Midwest region and the Georgetown upset really killed me. After that first weekend, I was ranked in the middle of a pool of 48 people despite faring pretty well in the other three regions. I only missed two games in each of the other regions after the first round and three more games total in the second round. The next weekend, I got five of the eight Sweet 16 games, but only predicted half of the Elite Eight games correctly. That moved me into 5th place in my pool for a short-but-sweet time. After Kansas, Indiana, and Ohio State fell, however, my Final Four wasn’t looking so hot. I fell to 7th place after Kansas lost to Michigan. Thank goodness for Louisville, my and the actual champion. After they pulled off a tight victory Monday night, I finished 4th in my bracket of 48 and 2nd in my bracket of seven.
Reporter Grayson O’Roark
March Madness, how appealing and exciting you are… for the first four minutes. That’s about how long my bracket lasted this year as Georgetown, who I had in my championship, was the first to fall victim to Florida Gulf Coast’s Cinderella run. Additional bracket disappointment and embarrassment came in the form of the Mountain West Conference’s pitiful performance.
I heard that, “the Mountain West is a great conference this year.”
“The Mountain West is great at playing at neutral locations,” they said.
What people meant was, “the Mountain West will devastate your bracket if you put any faith in them.”
Contact the CU Independent Sports team at Tips@cuindependent.com.
