2017 Conference Tournaments

Before the pairings are announced from the selected 68 teams on Sunday, March 12, there are 32 teams that will earn an automatic bid via their conference tournament. Here is the list of all 32 conferences with tournament dates. When the winner is determined, I'll update this post with the teams receiving automatic bid in place of the tournament dates.

Conference	Winner [Record]
AAC	SMU Mustangs (30-4)
ACC	Duke Blue Devils (27-8)
American East	Vermont Catamounts (29-5)
Atlantic Sun	Florida Gulf Coast Eagles (26-7)
Atlantic 10	Rhode Island Rams (24-9)
Big East	Villanova Wildcats (31-3)
Big Sky	North Dakota Fighting Hawks (22-9)
Big South	Winthrop Eagles (26-6)
Big Ten	Michigan Wolverines (24-11)
Big 12	Iowa State Cyclones (23-10)
Big West	U of California Davis Aggies (22-12)
Colonial	UNC-Wilmington Seahawks (29-5)
Conference USA	Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders (30-4)
Horizon League	Northern Kentucky Norse (24-10)
Ivy League	Princeton Tigers (23-6)
MAAC	Iona Gaels (22-12)
MAC	Kent State Golden Flashes (22-13)
MEAC	North Carolina Central Eagles (25-8)
Missouri Valley	Wichita State Shockers (30-4)
Mountain West	Nevada Wolfpack (28-6)
Northeast	Mount St Mary's Mountaineers (19-15)
Ohio Valley	Jacksonville State Gamecocks (20-14)
Pac 12	Arizona Wildcats (30-4)
Patriot	Bucknell Bison (26-8)
SEC	Kentucky Wildcats (29-5)
Southern	East Tennessee State Bucaneers (27-7)
Southland	New Orleans Privateers (20-11)
Summit	South Dakota State Jackrabbits (18-16)
Sun Belt	Troy Trojans (22-14)
SWAC	Texas Southern Tigers (23-11)
WAC	New Mexico State Aggies (28-5)
West Coast	Gonzaga Bulldogs (32-1)

NCAA Division I Men's Conference Tournament Dates (2017). Retrieved from http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/schedules/conference-tournament

2017 Tournament Schedule

Pre-Tournament Events
March 12: Teams Announced @ 5:30 PM [EST] on CBS
March 14-15: Four Play-In Games
March 16: Entry Deadline @ 12:30 PM [EST]

First Week Of Games
March 16-17: Round One - 64 Teams
March 18-19: Round Two - 32 Teams

Second Weekend Of Games
March 23-24: Round Three - 16 Teams
March 25-26: Round Four - 8 Teams

Final Weekend Of Games
April 1: Round Five - Semi-Finals - 4 Teams
April 3: Round Six - Championship - 2 Teams

NCAA Division I Men's Tournament Dates (2017). Retrieved from 
http://www.ncaa.com/march-madness/schedule

We Have A Winner And A Champion

Wow. What a great game tonight by Villanova and North Carolina. It kept me on the edge of my seat and hooting and hollering as the last few shots dropped into their nets. Such an enjoyable game this was to watch versus the semi-final blowouts. Villanova's shooting percentage was just lights out and the difference in the tournament.

Congratulations goes out to: Clint Magness. He correctly picked the winner of the tournament, the runner up, two out of four of the final four teams and six out of the final eight teams. Very well done!

The top five brackets are as follows:

1. Clint Magness
2. Tridi 1
3. Jeff "Maxxxxxxx" Maxwell
4. Kelly Mooberry 1
5. Cory Vogel

I hope you had a fun tournament the past four weeks and enjoyed as much basketball as you could watch. We will see you next season for our 21st year.

Then There Were Four

We have completed two weekends of games. We have lost 60 of 64 teams and our down to the last four remaining teams, Villanova, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Syracuse. We had all four number 1 seeds to start the round with eight teams remaining, but we lost three out of the four. From what the experts claimed, none of the Number 1 seeds were all that convincing, but with all of them making it to the field of eight, I believe the committee got it correct. Though I always like it when the favorites drop out early, it really shakes up our standings.

With our Office Pool standings, we have exactly eight tournament scenarios remaining. They are as follows:

If Villanova beats North Carolina
If North Carolina beats Villanova
If Villanova beats Syracuse
If Syracuse beats Villanova
If Oklahoma beats North Carolina
If North Carolina beats Oklahoma
If Oklahoma beats Syracuse
If Syracuse beats Oklahoma

Out of 407 submitted pick sheets, how many correctly picked....

Four out of the last four teams: 0
Three our of the last four teams: 11 sheets
North Carolina: 246 sheets
Oklahoma: 177
Villanova: 48
Syracuse: 2

Second Weekend Of Games Begins

We start back up tonight with four games on the schedule. It also looks like we are down to two TV stations as well, CBS and TBS.

Thursday, March 24 Tournament Schedule (all times Eastern)

On CBS
7:10 #3 Miami-FL vs #2 Villanova
9:40 #5 Maryland vs #1 Kansas

On TBS
7:37 #3 Texas A&M vs #2 Oklahoma
10:07 #4 Duke vs #1 Oregon

Friday, March 25 Tournament Schedule (all times Eastern)

On CBS
7:10 #4 Iowa State vs #1 Virginia
9:40 #11 Gonzaga vs #10 Syracuse

On TBS
7:27 #7 Wisconsin vs #6 Notre Dame
9:57 #5 Indiana vs #1 North Carolina