Broken Brackets

Griffin Bakken, Reporter

When March comes around there’s only one thing on people’s minds: March Madness. March Madness is the official tournament for Division 1 Men’s basketball. During this time most of the country compiles a bracket of how they think the tournament will play out. The goal is to see how perfect of a bracket you can make.

Some years of March Madness are very predictable with the higher seeds beating the lower seeds in games they were expected to win. However, it’s always fun to see how many upsets you can predict. Senior Carson Wallitner said, “I didn’t predict many upsets, however I did pick Murray State over Marquette. I was very excited watching them upset a school like Marquette.”

Murray state was a 12 seed and Marquette was a 5 seed so this was a tough prediction many people did not make. Upset always make the tournament fun, they develop an attachment to the teams and help get the people more invested in specific teams.

This year of March Madness was full of some incredible athletes. Across the board this year had some top talent. A lot of people enjoyed watching their favorite big name players take the court. Wallitner said, “I really enjoyed watching Ja morant play. He’s really fun to watch and was able to carry a small school like Murray State to a big win. His triple double in the first round was also really sweet.” Senior Myles Rupert said, “I liked watching Duke’s Zion Williamson play. He is an athletic freak and watching him dunk all over teams was crazy.” These household names made this year’s tournament a must watch.

While March Madness is fun it’s also heartbreaking to watch your chosen team lose. Rupert said, “I was so mad when a one seed like Duke lost so early, it ruined my bracket.”

Senior Isabella Filkins said, “I picked Buffalo to go far cause I like their team name. I was pretty upset when they got knocked out early.” This year was especially heart wrenching for many people as only one one seed made it to the finals.

The tournament ended up being an interesting one with Virginia playing Texas Tech for the championship. Virginia ended up winning the game 80-75 in overtime. Even though this year was a hard tournament to predict, watchers and bracket makers everywhere enjoyed the exciting competitive month of March Madness.