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Submit Picks for March Madness
Tired of the IG trying to catch you in an office basketball pool? Well, this contest is for you. You can make your picks on-line and compete for great prizes. Ok, there are no prizes, but you will get bragging rights that are priceless. And no prizes means perfectly legal. At least that is our story and we are sticking to it!
You must make your picks before noon, Thursday, March 17. We will try to keep a running count of how you did as the games progress. Your ranking will be in public, so don't do this if you don't want that. You will probably want to go find the brackets so you can do some research before you make your picks.
We plan to allow each to player update his picks after the first weekend. In effect, you will rate the Sweet Sixteen all over again. We we did this last year.
Instructions
You will rate all 64 teams in all four regional brackets of the Men's NCAA Basketball Tournament. It's not really picking winners, but ranking teams.
New in 2011: There are now four play-in games though they don't call them that. The winners of two of those games will be 16th seeds and have to play someone like Duke. The winners of the other two might slip in at something like a 10th seed. (At least, that is how we understand it. It's sort of complicated. Here is the NCAA explanation.)
Anyway, you do not pick who wins one of these play-in/first round games. You will rate the winner of each of these games, no matter who that is. If you want, you can wait to make your picks on Thursday morning when you will know the results of these games.
You rate each of the four regions separately. The teams in each region are rated 1 to 16. Use 1 for the team in each bracket you think is best. Use 16 for the team in each bracket you think is worst. (Let's repeat that for the Hokies out there. You would probably rate a good team 1 or 2. A crappy team would be a 15 or 16. Understand? A small number is good, a big number is bad.)
As the tournament progresses, each winning team will give you points equal to the number you gave that team. The lowest number of points wins. (Further explanation for Hokies: If you rate Duke number one and it wins, you get one point. You are doing well. But if Duke is upset by the opt in winner whom you rated 16th, you get 16 points and that isn't good, because you don't want points. It's like golf.)
You could, of course, just copy the seedings of the teams in the trounament. That would be cheating, plus what do the people who made those ratings know anyway? If you did that last year, you would have scored behind several competitors. You will, however, want to have a copy of the seedings handy to help you make your picks. Rating 64 teams is time consuming. If you know the numbers in advance, it should be easier. Here is one bracket. There are many out there. Just Google "NCAA basketball."
After the first weekend, you will be able to change your ratings of the Sweet Sixteen. These new ratings will not be made by region. You will rate the final 16 from 1 to 16. You may not change your ratings after that.
To Play
Enter the data below to get your personalized brackets. Then make your picks. Good luck!