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I love football (American), but March Madness is my favorite sporting event. When it first starts, at least four different networks air all the games. It’s so much fun to flip from one to another when a game gets close near the end. Or, u can watch ur favorite team’s entire game. Love it!
@@DNReacts Here is a fun fact about the NCAA tournament, and it is real, most vasectomies are performed during this time of year. There are even doctors who give free pizzas when men come in before the tournament to get a vasectomy.
The conferences get to choose how their autobid is chosen. They use the conference tournament so it can be a money maker. This is huge for the smaller conferences.. As for the at large bids most of the good teams come from about 7 or 8 conferences. They play more good teams during the year and have better players almost always.
I laughed so hard at "based on academic achievements"... College athletes, for the most part arent in college for academics. They do what they can to get by, have tutors to do that.
Great reaction. Selection Sunday is March 12th this year. And even that is an event. It's televised and they show the teams sitting in front of a TV waiting to see who is selected. 32 teams already know that they're going to the tournament but they don't know who they're playing or where they're playing. And then various teams know they're probably going to be selected, but several teams aren't sure -- they're said to be on the bubble. At large teams are picked based on strength of schedule; or impressive wins. It's always controversial. Because it can be quite subjective; but I think over-all they make the correct decisions. And, then the tournament itself is crazy. 4 networks. Spaced out across 4 time zones. Here in California, I can start watching games at 9:00 am. 16 games on the first Thursday. 16 games on the first Friday. And while you're watching a game, the other games scores are shown at the top of the screen so you can switch around, if you want to catch a more competitive game and/or upset in the making.
@@DNReacts I've responded to your question twice. Automatically deleted each time. Guessing that I'm not allowed to mention networks here (considered advertising?) Anyway, I guess you'll have to look it up.
One thing to know about the brackets. The whole bracket has to be filled out before the tournament starts. That means that you might be picking the winner of a game that never happened, if those two teams have already lost in an earlier round.
To really understand how captivating it is, Sometimes the "underdogs" can surprise the country. Example: In 2018, Loyola Chicago who hadn't been to a march madness tournament in over 30 years progressed to the final four playoffs beating some of the highest tournament seeds to get there. They were very close to winning the entire tournament. It was insane with many people rooting on the cindarella team
In regards to your comment about the selection committee just picking whoever they wanted: They don't just pick whoever they want. They compare things like the team's record and how hard their schedule was or the results of teams played each other to decide who the most deserving teams are. This typically leads to more teams from the 'power conferences' being selected since they are typically better teams and have shown that they are capable of beating good teams versus a smaller conference school who may have lost less games, but played far more easy teams Think of it this way, it's like trying to determine who is better between the 14th place team in the premier league and the 3rd place team in the championship. The championship team has a far better record, but has also played much lower competition.
one thing I didn't hear him mention is the fact that the brackets are often for prize money. You can fill the m out for fun, and there is a bounty on a "perfect" bracket if it is filled out on the official website, but also many schools/businesses/workplaces will print out paper brackets and hold a smaller more local competition. Usually you pay something like 5-20 dollars to submit a bracket, and whoever gets the most predictions correct wins everyone's buy in money. This is another reason March madness is such a huge thing, it has permeated culture outside of sports, I know tons of people who are not even sports fans but fill out brackets at work or wherever else just for fun.
@@DNReacts With how many upsets happen in March Madness, sometimes a person who knows nothing about college basketball might inadvertently make a fantastic bracket! Haha
All of the games are played on neutral courts. It’s an awesome experience to watch. Buy a one-day ticket and see four games back-to-back. It’s so fun to hear a neutral crowd slowly begin rooting for the underdog if they’re able to keep the game tight until the end.
If you want to see how insane some of the endings to these games are, I'd suggest reacting to "Villanova vs. North Carolina: Final minutes of national title game", one of the most iconic endings to a championship of all time and perfectly shows what March Madness is like.
Things like strength of schedule usually come into play when choosing teams and yes it can be quite biased in some situations. With so many teams it's hard to get every deserving team into the tournament.
358 Teams (division 1), divided into 32 conferences. Each conference tournament champion is automatically advanced to the BIG TOURNAMENT. Then, the committee selects the next best 36 teams (based upon difficulty of schedule, overall wins, strength of conference, etc). Every year there is controversy over the selections. That is why they added the extra 4 teams for the "play in"... to accommodate the teams that feel they were screwed out of an invite. It is possible to have maybe 8 out of 12 teams from a particular power conference... where as a weak conference will usually only have the 1 entry (being the champion of their conference tournament).
This year the bracket will be released on March 12 with all the individual conferences being played in the couple weeks leading up to it. The tournament itself starts with the 4 play-in games immediately that Tues and Weds and the big 64-team Madness begins right then on Thursday, so you don't have much time to get your brackets filled. For many teams, it's considered a successful season just to make it to the tournament itself regardless of outcome. For other top teams with a history of accomplishment, they are expected to be in the tournament and expected to win in the first couple rounds -- anything less is a disappointment. It's often referenced as a marker of success for a program or coach. For example, "this coach (from a small conference) has made it to the big tournament 4 of the 7 years he's been there -- they should keep him", or "this college has not made it to the tournament in 4 straight years after making it to the Final Four round in 2 straight -- what's went wrong?", or "will such and such program make the tournament this upcoming season and can they reach a seeding of 4 or better?". Everything in college basketball boils down to this tournament.
I feel like Americans are so Fascinated by British Culture and Vise Versa. It's downright pure entertainment either way it goes to see such reactions, especially when it comes to sports.
I generally take the first two days of the tournament off from work. I setup at least 3 tv's with the games on all day. I drink and eat snacks all day (similar to what American's do for the SuperBowl). I've seen HUGE upsets and players coming out of nowhere giving you a glimpse of what to expect when they are in the NBA next season (Steph Curry).
Great reaction guys. When you watch any March Madness highlights, look at the ranking number beside the school’s name. This will help you realize if an upset is happening. Also it can be a clue at how far into the tournament the game is. For example, a 1 v 16 is first round or a 2 v 7 is second round. Of course that assumes there hasn’t already been an upset. To my recollection, there has only been one 16 seed to beat a 1 seed.
That fourth state that was dotted over away from Texas and the couple other states was West Virginia ( my home state). West Virginia University transferred conferences several years back. This does not mean that all West Virginia teams are now in that conference. But, WVU ( located in Morgantown, WV) is the largest and most powerful school in the state. As an example Marshall University, MU, ( located in Huntington, WV) is a smaller school and as such is in a smaller conference. There was a movie based on the true story of a fatal plane crash involving the MU football team. That movie starring Mathew McConaughhey, portraying the head coach of the following year after the crash, is called “We Are Marshall. It’s based upon the crash of the 1970, I think, team’s plane. In which around 75 players, coaches, staff and boosters lost their lives. The premiere of the film was held in a theater in downtown Huntington, WV. To this day at home games and often away games as well, you will still hear chants of WE ARE MARSHALL! Some notable sports alumni that you may have heard of are: Troy Brown who played a long time with the New England Patriots, Byron Leftwich who played around 10 yrs in the NFL, Chad Pennington who was ranked #72 on the all time best college football quarterback list and played several years in the NFL as well. Plus many, many others. You might also have heard of one of Chad’s favorite receivers… a tall guy with hands of glue and could catch about anything… who once told Tom Brady, “Just throw it my way and high, I’ll go get it”. A guy that has a term named after him, You Got Mossed. Randy Moss. Great wide receiver despite his antics. He grew up about 30 miles away from where I did. He also went to high school with an NBA player that has several highlight videos on RU-vid. That being Jason “White Chocolate” Williams. I’d like to see you guys do a reaction to his stuff, either Street Ball Moves or his Best Passes. Btw, if you can’t tell, I’m a huge Marshall University fan. Great content gentleman, as always it’s a pleasure to watch.
The selection committee is controversial every year. Inevitably, a team which many/most feel is deserving, gets left out. Conversely, other teams are surprise selections. The committee members use a combination of objective data - wins/losses, quality of opposition, relative strength of conference, etc - and subjective observation to determine which teams are to participate. For example, a team which finishes with an overall record of 20 wins and twelve losses, may be selected in favor of one which finishes with 25 wins and 7 losses. The reason may be that the 20-12 team played in a more competitive conference, and its losses were all by slim margins, whilst the other team played in a relatively weak conference and was beaten soundly by those few strong squads they played. During the evaluation process, terms like "good wins" (a victory over a strong team on the road or at a neutral site), and "bad losses" (defeats to relatively weak schools, or blowout losses in games expected to be competitive) are thrown about. In general terms, Americans value success under pressure over sustained success over time. That's why we are comfortable with crowning a tournament winner with a modest record, as overall champions. We see this in all our sports. Even MLS, which does have what you would call a league champion (highest point total through a scheduled slate of fixtures), favors the playoff tournament winner as its official league champion. The former is called the Supporters Shield. The latter is the MLS Cup. They comprise two of the three legs of our treble, with the third being the US Open Cup (open to all leagues/divisions - equivalent to FA Cup).
College conferences used to be regional but now the trend is to add teams that bring financial value. The Big10, Michigan, Pennsylvania Ohio States are adding teams from LA California. Only 10 conferences in Football while basketball & baseball have over 30 conf
Realize conferences are their own entities with commissioners, refferies, Tv deals & some their own networks (SEC network) A coalition of Universities . But all conferences must agree to the same basic rules governed by the NCAA . Rules like numbers of scholarships players, practice hrs per week game rules, ect..
@@nathanlawson313 some would say the SEC/Big10 are greedy by making terms like BCS & Non-BCS or Power5 & G5 . Labels that diminishes the recruiting and money making power of half the FBS schools.
My absolute favorite event of the year. Growing up in North Carolina the tournament is basically treated like a holiday, we’d all watch it in school all day every day. North Carolina is home to 4 of the best teams in the sport those being Duke, UNC, NC State, and Wake Forest. Known as the Big 4. I’m a NC State fan and just watched our boys smash UNC today 😤
There's nowhere like Las Vegas to watch the opening weekend of the tournament on TV. Back in the day, before Sportsbook lounges began popping up everywhere, places like Ceasar's Palace were crowded from morning to midnight and the energy was off the charts.
I'm a college student at a college that is having one of their best seasons in school history. We're not in a very good conference, and we currently are in second place despite having one of the best overall records in the country. We're hoping we win our conference or the committee deems us good enough to make the tournament if we don't win our conference. Brackets are tough stuff. Nobody has ever had a perfect bracket by the time the round of 16 comes. Warren Buffet has offered a billion dollars to whoever gets a perfect bracket. People enter their brackets in online pools with chances to win prizes and pools with money too. My best bracket was for the 2018 tournament, where I was one of over 20 million brackets on ESPN and finished top 200. You'll also have what are known as "cinderella teams", teams that aren't supposed to do much and make some ridiculous runs. Last year, that team was the #15 seed St. Peters, a college with just over 3,000 students. In the tournament, they upset #2 seed Kentucky, #7 seed Murray State, and #3 seed Purdue, before losing to #8 seed North Carolina in the final eight (or elite eight). One of the biggest of the past ten years was #11 seed Loyola Chicago in 2018, who hadn't made the NCAA tournament since 1985. They went on a massive run where they beat #6 seed Miami, #3 seed Tennessee, #7 seed Nevada, and #9 seed Kansas State, before losing in the final four to #3 Michigan.
Took time off work so i can watch that first weekend of games.. its the best U were right on the conference tournament. You could win the reg season championship, but lose the conference tournament.. but if you win the regular season you get the #1 seed.. getting the #1 seed, you get the easiest path to the conf championship.. as a #1 seed, your first game is against the worst team in the conf, then play as the bracket plays out. That first 2 days are insane.. there is like 4 tv channels covering every game that is played.. from noon to close to midnight. Its 4 channels of nothing but college basketball
"Why are you asking us for a bracket? We dong have a clue..." - We don't either. You'll never have a perfect bracket. Pick the pretty colors. You have as much of a chance as the rest of us. :)
It would be easy to misinterpret the maps he showed to think all the schools within the shaded areas belonged to the same conferences. But footprints overlap. For example, the Big Ten and the Mid American Conferences occupy roughly the same area.
You made me laugh when you asked if academics had something to do with seeding; academics have nothing to do with college athletics; seeding is based on the committee’s view of how good each team is and this is determined by # of wins over other very good teams, # of bad loses, and loosely their finishing position in their league during the regular season and even less on how they do in their conference tournament if they are an at large team
This is so funny to watch from people who have no idea about it. It’s definitely a lot to grasp and learn, but March madness is my favorite thing of the year. I would put it over the Super Bowl easily
The conferences can get really confusing. Everything is currently being driven by college football and tv network money. In some ways similar to the “Super League” that almost happened in Europe. For example, two of the biggest brands the Texas Longhorns and Oklahoma Sooners are leaving that conference in the middle of the country for the Southeastern Conference because all the teams in the “SEC” conference will receive over $70 million more per year from ESPN/Disney company. The craziest move is USC & UCLA, out of Los Angeles, switching from the Pacific Conference to the Big 10 (the northern Midwest Conference). It’s the equivalent of Manchester United and Manchester City leaving the Premier League to play in La Liga, if La Liga paid the teams more money. Lots of conference realignment and changes happening in college sports right now.
Looks like you now need to react to March Madness buzzer-beaters and famous moments, though you might not see all of them as there are almost too many to count. Maybe also look up and watch the highlights of some of the biggest upsets in the tournament's history. As he mentioned, the very small schools usually get put into the lower seeds like 14 through 16, which makes those upsets even more incredible. Only around nine or ten 15 seeds have ever upset a 2 seed and only one 16 seed has ever upset a 1 seed since the tournament expanded to 64 teams. And the 16 seed upset was made even more crazy by the fact that they won by 20 points over the 1 seed. That would be like a team from the 5th or 6th level of English football beating Man City by 4 goals.
This was awesome to watch. I’m really excited that you get to experience the tournament for the first time. It’s unlike any sporting event on earth. You’re going to love it! Have you watched any of the conference tournaments this weekend?
This video adds lots of context to America's obsession with the under dog. If you want to see one of the best examples of this in college football, watch highlights Oklahoma v Boise state Fiesta bowl. The first time a mid-major bested a super power conference team in a major bowl game. You won't be disappointed.
Fellow Virginia fan and alum; let me give you a more concise, clear explanation: 1. March Madness is a single-elimination tournament to determine the national champion at the end of each season in the highest level of college basketball, Division I. 2. The tournament includes 68 teams, 14 of them each in four regional brackets, and four addition who play each other to get the final two of 64 slots. 3. There are 363 teams in Division I. They are in one of 32 conferences around the country. Each conference concludes its season with its own tourney; the winner automatically qualify for March Madness. 4. The remaining 36 team are selected at-large based upon the relative strength of their season, using computers models that are sometimes adjusted from year-to-year. Wins against elite teams are more valuable than wins against weaker team; wins on the road are weighed more heavily than wins on the road. Each season, there is controversy over the final teams selected and the teams that just missed the cut. 5. In the March Madness tourney, in each of the four regions, teams are seeded from 1 to 16, then match up based on their seeding: In the 1st round, #1 plays #16, #2 plays #15, etc. In the 2nd round, the winner of 1/16 plays the winner of 8/9, etc. 6. Not counting the four teams in the play-in-games, a team must win six straight games to win the national title. One off-game, even one bad stretch in a game, can end a season. 7. With so pressure, lower-seeded teams often upset higher seeded teams, and many games come down to the last shot. Hence the name March MADNESS. 8. The tendency for upsets has increased in recent year, because in the past two decades, a growing number of elite college players enter the NBA after just a single season of college basketball. Since those elite players almost always go to the elite teams in the six so-called power conference, the result is that elite teams have great talent but less experience and cohesion than lesser teams with lesser talents. To feel a sense of the excitement, watch what many consider the best March Madness game ever, linked below. The year before, Virginia had become the first #1 seed to get upset to a #16 seed in the first round. Virginia -- a university created by the writer of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson, would them seek redemption: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-eTMszLFSMh8.html
The 32 conf tournament winners automatically qualify for March madness. The other 36 teams that make up the initial 68 teams are fairly well known by the end of the season. The teams that win the regular season title in the “power 6” leagues. are basically locks to make as an “at large” team if they lose their conf tournament. So when the conf tournament are coming to an end, we all generally know who about 30 of the 38 at large teams are going to be. There are about 8-10 “bubble teams” come selection Sunday. There is always an argument of why one team was chosen over another for the at large bids. It would basically be like in the premier league the top 10 teams are going to make March madness no matter what based on how they finished the regular season. It’s those bottom 10 premier league teams that would be on the at large “bubble”. The conf tournament makes it interesting because a team can go winless during the regular season, 0-30 for example, but win their conf tourney and finish the season 4-30 can still qualify for March madness based on their conf tournament win. It would be like Southampton or Leeds this year finishing bottom two but win that end of year conference tourney, would qualify for the champions league. Arsenal and Manchester United would still be selected to be in the champions league because they did so well in the regular season still. Hopefully that makes sense. The video could of done a much better job of explaining how the teams who don’t win their conference tournament qualify, he breezed over that part. It’s not terrible hard to figure out.
LOL...Do not feel bad about not having a clue about who to pick in your bracket. Neither do the greatest of so-called experts. The unpredictability of this tournament is a big part of why it's called, "Madness."
Definitely. One of the best videos is Best March Madness of All Time -- 2022 Updated. Various other ones too. Gives you a true sense of the excitement . .. and Madness!
College sports are heavily based on polling (subjective rankings) because there are hundreds of teams and a true head to head evaluation is impossible for all of them. It’s definitely a source for controversy, but short of having a 300 game season there isn’t a better alternative. That’s why things like power conferences and prestige are so insanely important, and it’s yet another source of intrigue that makes college sports so huge in America.
Selections are done typically by rewarding teams who have beat the best teams and haven't lost to too many bad teams. This is done with the assistance of the "NET", a formula which calculates the best and splits them into quadrants (1st through 50th best teams are quadrant 1, 51st through 100th best teams are quadrant two, 101st through 200th best teams are quadrant 3 and 201st through 350th best teams are quadrant 4.) If you've got a lot of quadrant one wins and only a couple losses in quadrants 2-4, you're probably in the tournament. It's certainly controversial, but usually doesn't get as bad as the college football playoffs, since the teams near the cutoff will have had decent-but-not-great seasons and thus people already kind of know that as long as you play pretty well you're pretty safely in the tournament. And for the teams that do get the short end of the stick, there's actually a second tournament, called the NIT, which takes every team that one their regular season conference championship but missed the big tournament and all the teams who were just short of the tournament. It obviously isn't as big of a deal, but does provide an opportunity to end the year on a high note for many teams.
March madness is the single best tournament to exist. As a football (soccer) fan, it even beats the World Cup. So much drama, but it ALWAYS ends with the best 4 teams in the end. Can’t wait for March madness, and Rock Chalk
There's always some controversy on Selection Sunday and schools "on the bubble". This year's Selection Sunday is March 12th. Play-in games 14th/15th. Madness starts on the 16th. There's also a secondary tournament called the NIT for 32 schools that didn't get selected for the championship tournament.
The first 2 days (Thursday, Friday) is full-time basketball for 12 hours with multiple games. The “Cinderella teams” - small colleges playing crazy good (lucky) basketball - upsetting the powerhouse college teams are LOVED by Audience (and Las Vegas betters). == The 1979 Tournament featured Magic Johnson (Michigan State) versus Larry Bird (Indiana State) in the Championship Game. Record audience for TV … and then followed those 2 players into Professional basketball (NBA). By 1982, Michael Jordan, as a freshman at University of North Carolina made the Winning shot for Game. By 1990s, Michael was a professional basketball superstar. ==
I was born and raised in Los Angeles. The center of basketball, both Lakers (NBA) & UCLA (college). The Univ of Calif at Los Angeles (UCLA) won the most NCAA Basketball Championships with 11 (10 between 1964 and 1975...including 7 in a row), Kentucky won 8 times and North Carolina 6.
Basically it is almost impossible to fill out a perfect bracket, much less the winner The Only time you Could Predict the winner was in the 1960s- mid 1970s When UCLA won the NCAA Basketball Championship 10 out of 12 years, 8 times in a row with the Greatest Coach of All Time under the Late John Wooden (The Wizzard of Westwood) with two of the college greatest players in Lew Alcindor (Kareem Abdul Jabbar) and Bill Walton. But, UCLA won before they played at UCLA and After the graduated ( they were Not there at the same time) Two games made College Basketball when Number 2 University of Houston with All American Elvin Hayes played UCLA with Lew Alcindor in the Houston Astrodome in 1968. The First Basketball Game Ever Played in a Major Stadium with 60,000 fans. Houston won by 2 points, but UCLA would beat Houston by 44 points in their rematch in the Semi Finals of the Final Four..(they did not seed teams at that time) in the Greatest Exabition of College Basketball ever. UCLA would win the next two National Championships and then got a player named Bill Walton. They would then win 88 games in a row, before being upset by Notre Dame, but still win the National Championship. Then proceed to win it after Walton Graduated. The SECOND GAME in the National Championship game in 1979 and Still the Highest Watched Basketball Game in History. Ervin "Magic" Johnson and Michigan State beat mid major Indiana State led by Larry Bird in the Championship Game. Those two would save the NBA as at the time, it was filled with drug scandals and nobody watching it. Magic and Larry Bird's rivalry in the NBA saved it. They were rivials on the Court but great friends off it. Watch highlights of Larry Bird. "The Hick from Salt Lick" he was an unbelievable Basketball Player both in College and NBA...
@5:45 you're talking about the Big 12. That's WVU, West Virginia University, way over by itself. WVU has changed Conferences a few times over the last 40 years. We joined the Big 12 just 10 years ago. (Mens Soccer is Mid-American Conference and Women's Soccer is Big 12, so contracrs are by program not by school). We've had good teams and players over the years like NBA Hof and owner of the Lakers, and NBA Logo Jerry West, NFL Hof Sam Huff, current Seahawks Quarterback Geno Smith. Joining the Big 12 was to play a harder conference schedule to do better in the rankings, and also it improved recruiting.
A few years ago, Warren Buffet offered literally $1 Billion to anyone with a perfect bracket. Obviously, nobody won. All 20 million espn brackets were busted the FIRST DAY this year lmao. It’s madness
I'm from Charlotte, North Carolina. The ACC was life. Big UNC fan, fuck duke!!! When the ACC tournament started, our teachers would end class. We would spend Thursday and Friday watching basketball in school. Those were the days. Also, the bracket is used for gambling. A perfect bracket is worth 1 billion dollars.
All of the games are in pre-determined cities around the US but the locations your teams plays at could be close by, or really far. They’re all considered neutral and the Final Four is in a pre-selected city (this year it’s in Houston, Texas). There’s the Round of 64, Round of 32, the Sweet 16, The Elite 8, and The Final Four. The Final Four (semis) games and championship game always take place at an indoor football (NFL) stadium to accommodate the most number of people (70-80k people). When a seed other than a 1, 2 or maybe 3 makes it to the F4, it’s a big deal! Only one 1 seed (Virginia) has lost in the first round over a 16 seed. So that 16 seed, or any 11-16 seed who wins a game or two, is considered the Cinderella Story of that year. People select their brackets on who is best/records/seeding, or based on colors, mascots, flipping a coin, or blind reactions. It’s very fun and y’all should fill out your brackets after selection Sunday (3/12/23) before the (real) tournament starts the following Thursday (3/16/23) morning.
The most exciting long weekend in sports is First Round. Thursday-Sunday. Go to sports bars where they carry multiple games on multiple TVs. It’s sports nirvana!!
Okay, the time has come to really experience, again, how Americans love their sports fast and dangerous. Watch "Professional Bull Riding: 30 Most wretched Wrecks Of All Time". These guys are really crazy.
the guy on the video is obviously an ACC fan and a Dukr “puke” fan ( which i hate BOTH acc and puke ).. in case u cannot tell, college basketball fans r passionate and intense.. 50,000 Kentucky fans will camp in tents outside the gym for 7 days before the first practice of the season .. PRACTICE, NOT A GAME.. that is how intense these college basketball fanbases r
One important parallel: the first round proper of men's March Madness is much like the third round proper of the FA Cup -- 64 teams with lots of David v Goliath matchups. And "the magic of the Cup" applies here in similar fashion. St. Peter's University making the round of 8 in 2022 is similar to Shrewsbury Town going that far in the Cup after ousting Arsenal and Liverpool en route.
Why are we asking you to fill out a bracket? Because "nothing" is almost exactly as much as MOST Americans know about these teams, and most of us fill out brackets anyway! It's part of the fun, actually, guessing who'll win between teams that you've never heard of before. Some people pick teams based on their favorite colors, or on interesting mascots. You can flip a coin for every pick if you want. You can go "straight chalk" (picking the higher seeded team in every match-up), but I can guarantee you that there WILL be upsets where the lower seed defeats the higher seed. (Pro tip: always pick at least ONE 13 seed [there will be four of them] to win a first round game.) It's "madness" because you never know which "Cinderella" teams (unheralded, yet talented or lucky groups) will win some unlikely victories and make a run deep into the tournament. It's all just a mad bit of fun. You'll love it.
This guy doesn’t have a historic perspective. Even though the NCAA tournament has been around since 1939, it was pretty irrelevant until around the late 50’s. That’s why Wyoming won it in the first few years. Until then, the top 16 teams played in the National Invitational Tournament (NIT). So for practical purposes the NCAA Tounament really started catching national attention in the 60’s.
I have a suggestion. Duke vs North Carolina in the 2022 Final 4 Semifinal. Imagine El Clasico in the Champions League Semis but with a legendary coach’s (manager) final season for Duke. North Carolina beat Coach K (the legendary coach’s) in his final home game and beat him for his last game ever before retiring
I've always heard the selection is a combo of the obvious/inevitable, sporting politics, actual politics, public pressure, media pressure, etc. Lots of things rolled together.
I think one wild thing about Americans is pretty much every US sports fan knows at least a bit about the four major professional sports (NFL football, NBA Basketball, MLB Baseball and NHL Hockey) and can talk conversationally about all of those. Then they also often have a bunch of knowledge about some of the College/University versions of those sports, the general histories of the best teams in all of those leagues, etc. Not to mention those of us that enjoy Association Football, F1 racing, NASCAR - It's a little crazy to think about now that I'm realizing it...we might actually be too into sports over here 😂
I really hope you get to watch this whole tournament live.... it's the best tournament we have in the US.... buzzer beaters, upsets, day drinking and gambling... what more could you ask for...espn has a bracket competition you can do for free
Simply present these guys the Final Four to comment on. The championship inside a stadium filled with 70,000 spectators easily the biggest crowd for a single game of basketball anywhere in the world. Even the NBA cannot rival those numbers.
I don't know if anyone has mentioned that sports are a year round thing. With seasons overlapping. March Madness coming up. MLB starting spring training. NHL playoffs pretty soon. NBA playoffs in May and June. Baseball gets to the meat of it's games over the summer. College football and NFL start their seasons at the end of summer. The NBA, college basketball and then NHL start their seasons. College football and NFl end their seasons and playoffs at the end of the year and start of the next respectively. Not to mention Little League in the summer, high school football and basketball in the fall, and NASCAR just underway.
It’s funny but basketball is my least favorite of the big four sports of The US (basketball, American football, baseball and ice hockey), yet march madness is my favorite tournament.
The big 12 Conference, has went through what they call "conference re-alignment" where conference members leave their conference and join another,some conferences gain membership, some lose membership, and which is becoming more and more common now days. Furthermore , there can be more than one college in each State, Kansas has Kansas State and the University of Kansas, Oklahoma has Oklahoma State and U of Oklahoma, etc. The Big 12 has more than just 4 members , although it's not 12 anymore , I think it's ten now and they will lose two more soon, but will probably poach some teams from lesser Conferences to make up for losing the two.
There are 32 "leagues" (actually called 'conferences', each made up of groups of schools). The winner of each conference's end-of-season tournament gets an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament (aka March Madness). So, that covers 32 teams of the 68 teams in the NCAA tournament. The other 36 team selected for the NCAA tournament are selected by a committee based on their rankings and strength of regular season play. To illustrate, an example for the 2023 tournament: Univ of Houston had one of the best regular season records of all US schools in 2022-23, and were ranked #1 nationally going into their AAC conference tournament. But, Houston lost their conference championship game. The team that won that game got the *automatic* bid to the NCAA tournament. But, Houston, on the strength of its season, also got in -- and got in to the NCAA tournament as a #1 seed -- a much higher seed than the other team that beat them in the conference tournament. That's how the NCAA tournament makes space for very good teams that did not happen to win their end-of-season conference tournament.
10:20 factors include strength of schedule, W-L record against ranked teams (there are multiple polls updated weekly that rank the top schools 1-25), conference record if you're in a very strong conference. Nowadays more analytical approaches are being used that factor in opponent strength and pace of play. For example Alabama is averaging 83 points per game with 77 possessions per game for a 1.08 average per possession. But Purdue averages 73 ppg with 66 possessions for an average of 1.11 points per possession. So even though Alabama averages more points per game they average less points everytime they have possession.
Every game of March Madness is available to watch in the UK on ESPN player. You can get a week for free when you sign up, or it's a tenner for the month. It's well worth the tenner if you ask me. Fill out a bracket, put a bit of money on who'll do best, and stick on the 'whip-around', which is a bit like if Soccer Saturday showed the actual games
At 1 point you asked about how conferences are made up. It's mostly based on geography; been that way since the beginning when planes didn't exist & it was near impossible to play teams on opposite ends of the country. When I went to college in the late 1980s/early 90s these groupings still made sense. Since the new millennium schools will hop to different conferences in the hopes of gaining a competitive advantage by being in a power conference regardless of where it's based. That's why in the Big 12 conference you had West Virginia in there w/ a bunch of Great Plains schools & it's getting crazier by the year. Next season the Big 10 (which originated in the Great Lakes & as spread out to the East over time) will have 2 schools from Southern California. O_o A lot of it also has to do w/ more $ being earned via football, sometimes at the expense of in-state or regional rivalries in other sports.
10:30 EVERY YEAR. EVERY SINGLE YEAR. They have metrics they use to try to suss out the best of the rest to fill out the at-large bids, but ultimately there are a handful of teams every year that are considered super lucky to be in, and a handful that are convinced they were robbed.
You can download a bracket after selection Sunday. The first round seedings will be prepared. It's on you to guess the winners all the through to the championship. Typically it's for money.
Only think about the important stuff. The regions dont make any sense. For instance, Maryland just joined the Big Ten. The Big Ten is mainly midwest states yet Maryland is on the East coast lol. Dont worry about understanding the conferences.
I'll try to explain "March Madness." "March Madness" is the unofficial title for the annual American college basketball tournament. The tournament involves 64 teams. The governing body of college sports is the National Collegiate Athletic Association or NCAA. Not all schools participate in the NCAA tournament. Very small schools normally do not. There is another division of college basketball for those very small schools. As the regular season of the college basketball comes to an end, a NCAA committee decides who should be allowed to play in the NCAA Tournament. The first level of schools which are invited to the tournament are the "automatic qualifiers." "Automatic qualifiers" are schools that have won the championship of their conference. "Automatic qualifiers" are mostly schools that play in the conferences that have the best teams. After the "automatic qualifiers" are identified, the NCAA Tournament commitment selects the remaining teams that will play in the tournament until 64 teams have been selected. The NCAA basketball tournament is a 'win and advance" tournament. If a team loses, it is out and it does not play any more games in that year's tournament. As long as a team continues to win it will continue to play in the tournament. It all ends up with two teams playing each other for the National Championship. Since there are 64 teams in the NCAA Tournament it takes about 3 weeks for the champion to be determined. Until the championship game multiple games are played on a given day with the games being played on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. The championship game is always played on a Monday and it features the two teams remaining in the tournament. Normally the higher-seeded teams make the longest runs in the tournament and the national championship game is usually between two schools that are well known for having excellent basketball programs. However, occasionally there is a relatively unknown team that can get on a hot streak and advance deep into the tournament. Let me know if you have questions.
You should know, very few people know what they’re doing when they fill in their bracket, it’s just communal guessing and a lot of fun. No one ever guesses everything right and even Saturday Night Live has parodied this by doing a skit in which a college basketball fan with an almost perfect bracket is asked about his picks, and another person who did have a perfect bracket was asked as well. The first guy’s reasoning was all sports based, but the second person thought the bulldog was cute, and that Arizona would lose because “Arizona Ice Tea is so fattening”
I hate basketball. Like I dispise the sport. And every year like clockwork I fill out my brackets. Most places have money on the line for who ever has the best brackets. And it's just fun.
The Big 12 used to be the Big 8 but then we added Texas teams to make more money. Alas the cable deals the SEC and ACC deals teams were making for football made some of the original Big 8 schools contemplate leaving (Colorado and Missouri left and then Nebraska. Now also the one of the Oklahoma teams and one of the Texas teams. Now to fill in when we lost Colorado we added West Virginia - making it no longer a Midwest or regional league. And we added an additional Texas school. Also note that Iowa has lots of schools one goes into the 12 and the other is Big 10. There are several schools in Kansas 2 in the Big 12 and I’m not sure where Wichita State plays. Also Missouri has at least three schools that could qualify. (Private and state)
It’s not that hard, it’s just champions league, but single elimination, and it’s played at the end of the whole country league play is finished then the madness begins, it’s like Barcelona losing to a English league 2 team and eliminating them and beating PSG and then Beating Man City to get to the champions league final 4. It’s just academy’s Not professional sports franchises. Also to win awards on the national level you’re going to have to play competitively and against good teams every week. The premier league is the best league top to bottom, but you guys will give the best player award to players in la liga which isn’t comparable to the premier league. It’s kinda hard for us Americans to understand that concept of not playing the best teams each week and still be considered a great player. If a player scores 50 goals in the MLS we know he isn’t Mbappe. As Americans it’s no dodging, you want the praise and glory, Win no matter what, make it through and you’ll get praise.
The brackets are used for gambling. The simplest form is at your workplace. Everyone who wants to, fills out a bracket and throws money into the pot. The money is then distributed at the end of the tournament based upon who got the most number of games correct. The same basic thing happens at legal gambling casinos. The Super Bowl and the NCAA Tournament are the two most wagered upon sporting events in the U.S. You can win your leagues regular season title, lose your leagues championship tournament and still make it into the NCAA tournament. There are 68 openings and only 32 automatic berths. That leaves 36 berths that the selection committee chooses. We also have something called the Top 25 poll. It's a poll that selects the Top 25 teams in the nation and that poll is updated every week during the season. Almost all those teams will make the tournament via the selection committee. The hard part for the selection committee is filling those last few berths because there are always more deserving teams than available berth. Things that are considered are the strength of your league, the strength of your league against other ranked teams, and the strength of your team's schedule. The bracket is split into 4 mini tournaments of 16 teams each. They are called Regionals and kind of correspond to the 4 time zones in the continental U.S.. Each mini bracket has the teams seeded 1 thru 16; 1 plays 16, 2 plays 15, 3 plays 14, and so on. The tournament starts on Thursday afternoon and the first and second rounds are over on the following Sunday night. Only 16 teams (called the Sweet 16) will be left at that time. The next round starts on the following Thursday and ends on Friday. 8 teams will be left (the Elite Eight) and they will play on Saturday and Sunday. That will leave four teams and they are known as the Final Four. Those four teams will play the following Saturday and the Finals will be played on the following Monday. All of the preceding games are not played at the site of the Final Four. The site that hosts the Final Four only hosts that portion of the tournament. If you want to get a feel of what the tournament is like without actually watching it, I suggest you watch some RU-vid videos called "One Shining Moment". They're basically 3 minute videos that encapsulate the tournament. Except for the part with the championship game highlights, they are ready to be broadcast after the final game. All they do is add in a few highlights from the championship game and then broadcast right after the championship trophy is presented. Some of the best stories of the tournament is when a small school with a low seed starts knocking off better schools that they have no business beating. Slowly, little by little, every fan who is not aligned with their opponent is rooting for them and they begin to feed off of it and do things they thought they were never capable of doing.
bracketts… every year the 68 teams that get in the tournament will be announced on selection sunday march 16, u then have 2 days to predict who will win all 67 games of the tournament.. u have to predict all 67 games before the first game starts on the night of the 18th… it is beyond tough.. in fact warren buffett has offered a billion dollars to anyone that gets all 67 games correct, no one has ever gotten all 67 games right.. millions of bracketts r filled in yearly and none has ever been perfect… which is hard to believe since ur only picking winners, not predicting a score or point spread.. so u would think it would be easier.. NOT… it is a very emotional event.. these 6,000 players/coaches have worked their asses off for 5 months and suddenly it is win to advance or lose and ur season ends .. the first 6 days r crazy.. u go from 68 teams down to 16 in 6 days… u should like Kentucky same as me.. since Kentucky is UK
We are just starting all the conference tournaments. Most start this weekend or next... but a couple small conferences tourneys are happening right now! Most years I take off work on those first Thursday and Friday to just watch 🏀 all day long. Sitting in a sports bar with TVs everywhere and multiple games on at the same time.... it can't be beat.
Yes, all of the conference tournament champions earn an automatic invitation to the NCAA tournament, but there are also a good-sized number of invites given out to teams who did NOT win their conference tournament. There's a committee that closely examines the "resume" of each non-tournament champion to decide which other teams will also make it into the big tournament. Teams with a record that's CLOSE to being good enough to earn a spot in the tournament are said to be "on the bubble". These "bubble" teams may or may not actually make it into the tournament. All the teams are announced on "Selection Sunday", and even THAT is a fairly major event in American sports.
There's two parts to the brackets---filling out who you think will be selected and where they will be placed in the brackets, and separately, once the actual brackets for have been completed by selection and (the play in games) you then make your selection on who will win each game right up through the final four and the national championship game. These are the source of many, (many) office pools with some decent money if you win (thousands of dollars)--as well as within-family pools, and of course, formal betting that takes place on each game as well as just about everything else. March Madness.
Almost spit out my drink laughing when you asked if selection is based on academic achievement. It's based entirely on team performance.... March Madness generates around 1 billion dollars in revenue, so academics are definitely not the priority.
There’s a 1 billion, yes billion with a B prize if you can fill out the bracket and have every game right. Btw it’s never happened and probably never will.
Someone may have posted this already, but just in case: many men, if they're going to have a vasectomy, schedule it for a Wednesday, the day before March Madness starts - because the recovery time is usually a couple of days. So between that and the weekend, guys basically have a doctor's note to stay home and sit in the couch in front of the TV, watching 12 hours of basketball every day.
Don’t try and figure out the geographical connections between schools in the same conference hahaha it used to make sense a long time ago but more schools are joining these conferences that are no where near the other schools. USC and UCLA (Southern California schools) just joined the BIG10 conference which is predominantly in the Midwest/east. It’s all about the money the schools can make
