WhereToWatch Bracket Challenge Update – My Dog is Losing

Posted on March 21, 2012 by Todd Davis

Well, the first two rounds are finished and we’re left with the Sweet Sixteen. Hopefully you still have most of the remaining field left in your bracket. In general, the WhereToWatch group is doing pretty well. We currently have three entrants in the top 92.4% or above. JustinBh1 is in the lead with 450 points, but he has Missouri winning it all, which obviously affects his chances since he has the least possible points remaining. It’s anyone’s game at this point.

Notably, I’m coming in dead last. Yes, I’m the one who didn’t get a bracket in after all of the poking and prodding I did to everyone else, so let the ridiculing begin. But there’s a back story to why I didn’t get it in and it has something to do with filling out my bracket on a plane to Vegas, a faulty internet connection in the hotel, and a roulette table at 7:00 in the morning. The rest are just insignificant details. I will add up my “paper” bracket and post it right along with everyone, but it’s not looking good as I only have two of my Final Four teams remaining.

A good sign for humanity is that my dog Leto is currently in the “true” last place spot at 0.8%, so no matter how bad your bracket is, at least you’re not getting beat by a dog. (You’ll recall he picked his bracket last week.) He does have Syracuse and MSU going to the Final Four, so watch out.

We’ll keep you updated on the standings and announce the winner in a couple weeks. Good luck and enjoy the best sports month of the year!

Locate Where Fans Are Watching Your Team During the NCAA Tournament

Posted on March 20, 2012 by Todd Davis

Well, the first weekend of the tournament is over and we’ve had some huge upsets already. Hopefully you got to watch the games with people who were rooting for your team, otherwise it can be kind of a downer. If your team is lucky enough to still be left in the tournament, then check out our home page on WhereToWatch.com, where we’re all about helping you locate a watch party. It’s always fun to watch the game with people wearing the same team’s logo on their shirt, especially during the NCAA Tournament.

This weekend, while traveling to Las Vegas for the first round of games, I met up with the local Kentucky Wildcats watch party at The Pub in the Monte Carlo Casino. It was an awesome time as there were about 40 Cats fans in the building. It was even better for me since I arrived a day earlier than the rest of my group and I was in Sin City all by my lonesome. That changed Thursday afternoon, however, when I met some of the rowdiest Wildcat fans around. I had a blast and made some friends that I ended up hanging out with all weekend. A few Wildcat chants even broke out during the game–it was an overall great time.

The website currently has tons of watch party locations up for the teams left in the tournament. If you’re looking for where to watch with other fans, click on any of the following teams and it will automatically pick up your IP address and take you to the TV viewing party in your area: Ohio State Buckeyes, North Carolina Tarheels, Baylor Bears, Michigan State Spartans, Louisville Cardinals, Syracuse Orange, Wisconsin Badgers, Kansas Jayhawks, Indiana Hoosiers, and the Kentucky Wildcats. Click on the links to see if there is a watch party in your city. You may have to sign up to see the list, but it takes five seconds and it’s free. If you know of a viewing party near you that we’ve missed, leave us a tip.

The Magic of March

Posted on March 8, 2012 by Todd Davis

Welcome to March, in this sports fanatic’s opinion, the best month of the twelve. The lone month when the dead horse beating morons (read Mike and Mike and the rest of their ESPN cronies) come up for a breath from the 24/7 NFL news cycle to discuss something else, albeit briefly. I understand that the NFL is king, but it would be nice to hear about some other happenings from time to time… but I digress.

Here in the Bluegrass State, we like our football and we like our baseball, but you better believe that you can strike up a college basketball conversation with anybody on the street any day, any time, anywhere. You can say what you like about the importance of conference games and what it means to play a mid-major in mid-November, but here it matters… they all matter. And that is what is so fantastic about this time of year, to me anyway, the entire county catches the basketball obsession that us Kentuckians carry all year.

I hope that you’ve already been watching. Tell me that you have been watching. The magic has already begun, it is in the small conference championships the past few nights. On Monday night, there were 4 such championship games, with final scores of: 78-74 (St. Mary’s over Gonzaga in OT), 59-56 (VCU over Drexel), 48-44 (Loyola Maryland over Fairfield), and 93-91 (Davidson over Western Carolina in double OT). That is a total of 3 overtimes and a combined margin of victory of 13 points. On Tuesday night, there were 3 more: 74-70 (Western Kentucky over North Texas), 52-50 (Western Illinois over South Dakota State in OT) and a 70-50 game (Detroit over Valparaiso) in which the winning team was losing at the half. All in all not bad TV… right?

Not only are these close games, these are close games with emotion running as high as it will get for the young men involved. If these teams are fortunate enough to make it to the big dance, it often results in a blowout, but that is not what matters. They are playing for the opportunity to make the trip to the tournament, to play in games on national television, to be able to tell their grandchildren that they made it. And the best part is that you can see it in their faces. Every time someone makes a big shot or snares a rebound, that look is there. You can see it on the bench with the rise and fall of walk-ons as the game teeters in the balance. The game winning shots, the rushing of the court… the tears on the sideline. The entire year of work coming down to one possession. An entire year in a pass, in a play, in a steal or in a shot. I’m not talking about major conference tournaments here, I’m talking Horizon League, Summit League, Sun Belt, and WCC. I’m not talking Wildcats, Orangemen, and Tar Heels… I’m talking Catamounts, Rams, Mean Green, Hilltoppers, Titans, Leathernecks, and Jackrabbits. Its about young men who have worked all year or maybe even 2, 3, or 4 years for this one opportunity, this one chance to get to play in the most exciting events in all of sports… the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament. To get the opportunity to be the team that pulls the upset, the surprise in the Sweet 16, or the once a decade miracle in the Final 4. This my friends, is the best time of the year.

The major conference tournaments can be great as well, but oftentimes lack the intense drama of the small conference tournaments. Yet we still have seen more than our fair share of thrillers and stay up all night-ers (looking at you ‘Cuse and Uconn). Most of the excitement comes from the bubble teams with the win or go home (or NIT) mentality, and from the teams playing for a potential #1 seed in the NCAA Tournament.

This brings us to the king of the office pool itself, the big 64 68. Is there anything better than parking yourself at a bar on the first Thursday and Friday of the tournament and watching as many games at once as you can possibly handle? Beer in one hand and bracket in the other… celebrating wins of teams you haven’t watched all year, hoping that a mid-major beats that team you cannot stand with that coach who is a total douche, and all the while cheering with friends, family and some dude you met an hour ago that picked that upset too. It doesn’t get any better than March, and it doesn’t get any better than the NCAA Tournament. Let’s enjoy this one… I know I will. Go bars, go beers, go basketball, and most importantly… GO CATS!!

By: Dru Boyer