March Madness Day 1: Everything but the Buzzer Beater

When I first published The Ghost of Five Mile Creek last spring, my friend Brandon did a classic friend-of-a-writer move on me.  In this move, you give your writer friend a cool idea "for their next book", and then sit back and wash your hands of it while waiting for your friend to put in the 2,000+ hours of research, writing, and agonizing over it that might make it a realistic possibility. 

The book idea: The Greatest Four Days in Sports: Opening Weekend at the NCAA Tournament. 

Brandon's thesis was that the first four days* of March Madness are indeed the four greatest days of the sports calendar each year, and that a book by me would be the best way to celebrate it for the remaining 361 days. 

I'm not going to lie and say that's not an awesome idea for a book, because it is, and it's one that I would probably read cover-to-cover numerous times if it existed. But I'm also not going to lie and say that it's something I see myself having the skill or motivation to do properly anytime in the near future.

So here is my compromise: the 2022 edition of the Greatest Four Days of Sports have arrived, and I can blog about them if even if I'm not ready to book about them just yet. 

The Greatest Four Things I Saw in Day 1: 

• Frankie Collins sparks Michigan comeback: My Wolverines shrugged off a rough start against a hot shooting Colorado State team and, in the 12:15 time slot, avoided being the very first team eliminated from the tournament this year. Trailing 28-13 and without starting point guard DeVante' Jones, Michigan was struggling in all areas and finding their tourney hopes on early life support. A ten second sequence where Frankie completed a twisting and-one drive, then pickpocketed the CSU ballhandler and put down a two-handed dunk (there's no way he's 6 ft) on the other end got Michigan right back in the game. They went on to outscore the Rams by 23 points the rest of the game and advance somewhat comfortably.

• St. Peter's Busts My Bracket: Yes, I picked Kentucky to make it all the way to the championship game. However, anyone reading this probably cares about my bracket to the same degree that I care about their fantasy football teams, so whatever. To be perfectly honest, I don't care much about my bracket either, so give it up for St. Peter's. The 15 seed went toe-to-toe with the one-and-dones and pulled off an overtime upset that really didn't all that flukey. They just fought hard for 45 minutes and matched every punch from a Kentucky team that couldn't hit much from the outside and didn't appear like they wanted to work quite as hard as the... as the St. Peter'ses. I don't know their mascot. Hell of an upset though.

• Creighton Creightons SDSU in overtime: This is everything that an 8/9 matchup is supposed to be. This is everything Creighton is supposed to be. They're a squad that shows up in the tournament as a mid-seed often enough, never advances all that far, but manages to have some classic moments from time to time. My first Creighton experience was Terrell Taylor hitting a game winner over Florida in the 2002 tournament; tonight's episode of Creighton involved a 9-0 run in the final minutes to force overtime and Trey Alexander with a huge stepback two and an and-one finish at the basket to put the Blue Jays over San Diego State in OT. 

• Ja Morant and Bill Russell would be proud: I'm partially lying about 'seeing' this one because I went to bed as they went into overtime, but the often-overlooked alma maters of Russell and Ja capped off the night with a flourish. San Francisco, wearing some minimalist uniforms that wouldn't have looked out of place in Bill Russell's day, rallied back from eight down in the final two minutes. In the extra frame, the part I slept through, Murray State wouldn't fold, making enough plays for a 92-87 win. Now all Murray State has to do to reach their first ever Sweet 16 is to knock off a 15 seed. 

The Greatest Four Players I Saw in Day 1:

• Teddy Allen, New Mexico State: The journeyman Allen is playing at his fifth different college in five years, and he just became a legend in the state of New Mexico. While he seemed to be trying really hard to get a technical for taunting/showboating down the stretch yesterday, Allen also dominated 5th seeded UCONN to the tune of 37 points (tournament high for the day) in an upset win.
• Doug Edert, St. Peters: Listen, this scene plays itself out on pickup courts across the country every single weekend: If you're the little skinny white guy with a moustache, you're going to be left wide open until it's too late. Edert came off the bench firing, and by the time Kentucky started throwing defenders at him, he was already unconscious. Edert hit a few crazy contested ones down the stretch, knocked down 8-8 free throws, and scored 20 points on only 7 field goal attempts. 
• Oscar Tshiebwe, Kentucky: Every other player and coach on the Kentucky team will deserve the tomatoes and cabbages likely to greet them on arrival back in Lexington, just as long as they leave Tshiebwe out of the crossfire. On a night that will live in infamy in the Bluegrass State, it's hard to pin much blame on a guy who put up 30 points and 16 rebounds, even in defeat.
• Brady Manek, North Carolina: Paul Bunyan's long-lost great-grandson absolutely went off for the Tar Heels yesterday; 28 points, 11 rebounds, 5 threes, and a 95-63 obliteration of Marquette in an 8/9 game. 

Day 1 Recap:

• Madness Level: 9 out of 10. 
• There were four different double-digit seeds that advanced on Thursday. I don't really consider Michigan's 11/6 win over Colorado State to be a true upset, but Richmond and New Mexico State's wins definitely qualify. St. Peter's over Kentucky was the game of the day, and an upset that will go down with some of the all-timers. 
• Vermont and Akron couldn't quite pull off upset bids, but they had traditional powers Arkansas and UCLA sweating profusely in two of the late-night games.
• We also had three overtime games on the night slate, two of them involving pretty fierce comebacks to force OT. 
• A pathetic series of buzzer beater attempts (seen below) was the only thing preventing a chaotic bliss of pure unadulterated March Madness on the opening day. 
• Buzzer Beater Chances: 0 out of 4. 
• Creighton and San Diego State each had a chance, both failing in pretty comical fashion. Creighton ended regulation way down on the baseline past the basket and airballed an attempt a Larry Bird-style over the backboard shot. Trailing by 2 at the end of overtime, San Diego State fumbled away what would have been a solid look from the top of the key.
• Tied at 73-73, Murray State was able to run down the final 15 seconds of regulation but couldn't even get a shot off. 
• Kentucky probably had the best look of any potential buzzer beater, a 17-footer from the wing. However, St. Peter's defense held strong (it was actually Doug Edert again on the close out), and TyTy Washington was forced into a rushed shot that airballed by several feet. 
• My Bracket Status: On life support, but crisis sort of averted.
• Picked 11 of 16 games correctly.
• Losses were Iowa, Kentucky, S. Dakota State, UCONN, Indiana
• The only "upset" I picked right was Michigan. I was never going to pick against them, and it wasn't really an upset in my book, so no back pat for that.
• Kentucky was a major loss, had them in the final game.
• I really didn't want to pick Iowa to go far since they choke in the tournament with alarming regularity. I just felt like they had a soft side of the bracket, so against my better judgement I picked them in the Elite 8. Of course, they went on to have a vintage Iowa NCAA tournament performance and got bounced by perennial giant-killer Richmond.
• I have Arkansas in the Final 4, so if they'd gone down too, that would have been the death blow, but as it stands all is not lost just yet.

*The first four real days obviously. I don't think the play-in games would even crack the top 320 in terms of greatest sports days in a calendar year.