Advice For Filling Out Your Bracket

If you know me at all you know that following Christ is the most important part of my life and after that one of my biggest interests is sports. March Madness is the best and most exciting and thrilling time of the year. When filling out your bracket don't get your hopes up for filling it out perfectly. Its nearly impossible. You have a better chance of winning the lottery, getting hit by lightning and your car getting hit by a meteor in the same day than you do filling out a perfect bracket. So don't get your hopes up. First off, you need to disregard all personal biases when filling out your bracket. Now here are some FACTS you need to know when filling out your bracket.

The Opening Round:

1. Do NOT pick any 16 or 15 seeds to win. A 16 has never won and over the past 8 years 15s are 0-32.

2. Only once since 1985 have all top-4 seeds advanced past the 1st round. So pick one 13 or 14 to win in the 1st round.

3. In 19 of the past 21 years a 12 has won at least one game. Last year 3 of the 4 twelves won. So Pick at least one 12 seed to win a game.

For the Sweet-16:

1. Only in 14 regions out of 100 since the tourney expansion in 1985 have all 1,2,3,4 seeds advanced to the sweet 16. So, DONT pick all 1,2,3,4 seeds to advance to the sweet 16 in all the regions.

2. Since 1985, 88 out of 100 #1 seeds have reached the sweet sixteen. So, your best bet is to put all the 1 seeds in the sweet sixteen.

3. 9 seeds only have 3 sweet sixteen appearances since 1985. Don't pick a 9 seed to win more than one game.

4. This is just something to think about: In this year's field only Michigan St., Xavier, and Villanova have advanced to the sweet sixteen each of the past 2 years. Kansas has done this each of the past three years.

Elite Eight:

1. The only time all elite eight teams were seeded fourth or better was in 1995. So, pick a cinderella, they don't have to be a double digit seed, but at least one 5 seed or higher will make the elite eight, most likely more than one.

Final Four:

1. Only twice has there been a final four without a 1 seed. Pick at least one #1 seed.

2. Only once has the final four been all #1 seeds (2008). Three #1 seeds in the final four has only happened three times itself. Your best bet is to pick only 1 or 2 #1 seeds (I'm going with 2).

3. In the last 21 years only 8 teams outside the top-4 seeds have gotten to the final four. 3 of those 8 happen in the same year (2000). Your best bet, pick teams seeded 1-4 for your final four.

4. At least two teams from the same conference have made the final four in 18 of the past 25 years. Its okay to have 2 teams from the same conference in the final four.

For choosing your national champion. I will explain my choice in my next post. In the meantime good luck filling out your bracket.