By Jeff Orvis
Okay, the time has finally come. I realize that there are legions of basketball fans out there who have printed off their NCAA basketball tourney brackets and have had their pens poised, just waiting for me to release my predictions. Normally, I make my predictions round by round, so if there are too many upsets in the first round, my whole bracket isn't ruined. But this time, I decided to get the whole thing over with at one time.
Before you take the following picks as gospel, you might want to consider this: Years ago when I was still in Independence, our city clerk, Clark Madison, conducted a friendly tournament pool. We each chipped in a few bucks with dreams of winning enough to make a car payment or a rent payment. Alas, most every year, after the first round, he would stop by my office with the crushing words, “Thanks for the donation,” meaning my picks were so far off-base, I had no chance.
Each year, I try to watch as many tournament games as I can. It was a tradition that I would take a couple of days of vacation to catch the first round games during the day, throw a corned beef brisket in the oven in honor of St. Patrick's Day and sit back and relax. I usually have a few teams I like to follow for various reasons. This year, three teams have Iowa connections. Iowa State opens with the defending national champs from Connecticut with the promise of facing the nation's best team, Kentucky, in round two.
I like North Carolina because one of its big stars is Harrison Barnes from Ames. Creighton is also in the field this year. The Blue Jays feature former UNI Coach Greg McDermott and his son, Doug.
I'm also interested in how four other teams do this week. Murray State deserves a long run because that little team that few have heard of finished with a 30-1 record. Virginia Commonwealth is back in the field after shocking the nation and the so-called experts last year before losing to Butler in the Final Four. I like Duke because I think that Coach K is one of the best of all time. My last sentimental favorite is Harvard, which is in the field for the first time since 1946.
With the preliminaries out of the way, here are my fearless predictions:
First round winners – Kentucky, Iowa State, VCU, Indiana, UNLV, Baylor, Notre Dame, Duke, Michigan State, St. Louis, New Mexico, Louisville, Murray State, BYU, Florida Missouri, Syracuse, Kansas State, Harvard, Wisconsin, Cincinnati, Florida State, Gonzaga, Ohio State, North Carolina, Creighton, California, Michigan, North Carolina State, Georgetown, St. Mary's and Kansas.
Second round winners – Kentucky, VCU, Baylor, Duke, Michigan State, New Mexico, Murray State, Missouri, Syracuse, Wisconsin, Cincinnati, Ohio State, North Carolina, Michigan, Georgetown and Kansas.
Third round winners – Kentucky, Duke, Michigan State, Missouri, Syracuse, Ohio State, North Carolina and Kansas.
Final Four – Duke over Missouri and North Carolina over Syracuse.
National Champion – North Carolina.
There could be some surprises along the way, that's why they play the games, I guess. I realize that the Big Ten Conference was acknowledged to be one of the best conferences in the nation this year, but it's hard to pick against the ACC. I also realize that most folks think Kentucky will win it all, but they proved last weekend that they can be beat.
Three other teams with ties to Iowa or the Quad-City area are in the NIT Tourney. Iowa takes on Dayton and UNI plays St. Joseph's. I'm also interested in Stanford, which plays Cleveland State. One of Stanford's top freshmen is Chasson Randle, who played his prep ball at Rock Island and was Mr. Basketball in Illinois last year. Every time I saw his highlights in his senior season at Rocky High, I was reminded of the film clips of LeBron James when he wowed the state of Ohio a few years ago.
So get ready for what Dick Vitale calls the “best three weeks of the year.” The action starts Tuesday night.
As a post-script, as I write this, the women's tournament bracket show is a couple of hours away. I probably won't make any big predictions on this tourney, although I hope Iowa and Iowa State both make the field. I'll also be hoping Maryland and Coach Brenda Freese of Cedar Rapids and Connecticut and Kia Stokes of Linn-Mar (Marion) also do well.
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