There were a lot of close games, but not a lot of surprises in Day 1. Only two games were upsets, insofar, as the lower seed advanced. Neither was much of a “bracket buster” style upset.
Upsets
#10 Nevada beat #7 Michigan St. Michigan St. blew a 9 point halftime lead, and could only score 23 points in the second half.
#12 Manhattan beat #5 Florida. Every year a 12 beats a 5. This was the one, most expected. Manhattan is better than a #12, with its talent and experience. Florida has been on a downward spiral, but surged to the SEC Championship game to get such a high spot. The real surprise, was the way Florida quit in the game.
Piece of Cake
The #1 seeds had no problems. St. Joe’s blew the game open against Liberty early and coasted from there. Duke mauled Alabama St. Same for Stanford against Texas-San Antonio.
#2 UConn started slow, but won with ease against #15 Vermont. The same thing for Gonzaga against Valpo.
Second Half Runs
#3 Texas found itself behind after the first half against #14 Princeton. To start the second half, led by Brandon Mouton, Texas went on a 24-8 run and held on from there. Texas could not miss at the 3-point line (11-15), with two guys combining to go 9-10.
#6 North Carolina had its own big second half run to beat #11 Air Force. Air Force held a 6 point lead with 13 minutes left in the game, but had two extended scoring droughts that allowed UNC to pull away.
Texas and UNC face each other on Saturday. Can we just skip the first half?
The 8/9 Surprise
You really can’t go wrong picking the #9 seed over the #8 seed. The #9 seed had a 42-34 edge on #8 seeds in games heading into this year. I let my personal biases decide these games, because it’s mostly harmless. The next opponent is the #1 seed, so it’s not a bracket buster if wrong. Today, the #8 seed won both games played. Texas Tech held off Charlotte, to actually let Bobby Knight into the second round in a few years.
Seton Hall came back to beat Arizona. Arizona’s disappointing season gets an exclamation point.
The #9 seed I was sure would win was Southern Illinois. They stormed back from a 10 point halftime deficit to take the lead with less than 20 seconds. Of course, they allow Alabama to run right down the court and retake the lead and win 65-64.
A stunning 3-0 day for the #8 seeds. It’ll be up to UAB to prevent the sweep.
The “If Only” Games
Three teams not really expected to have trouble in the opening round, but did. They survived, but it wasn’t pretty. The kind of game where the other side looks back at certain plays and says, “If only…”
#4 Wake Forest, playing in Raleigh, North Carolina needed a score in the last minute and defensive stops to beat #13 Virginia Commonwealth, 79-78.
The other ACC #4 team, Maryland, really looked liked they were getting gassed by the end of their match-up with University of Texas-El Paso. They surrendered the lead late, but got it back and held on to win 86-83. For the Terps, you have to wonder how much they have left after their ACC Tournament run.
#5 Syracuse was expected to take apart #12 BYU. Syracuse’s 2-3 zone, and banging style was to be too much for BYU to handle. Syracuse had to abandon the zone for man-to-man after BYU kept shredding it, and the Mormons were able to bang around on the inside. Syracuse won because Gerry McNamara had a career game. He had 43 points, with 9 3-pointers. His only blemish was a subpar (for him freethrow shooting game of only 12-16).
Both Maryland and Syracuse survived similar 1st round scares in their runs to the national championship the previous 2 years. Maryland and Syracuse play each other on Saturday.
Last Man Standing
Last game of the night turned out to be a double overtime piece of ugly. This was no instant classic. This was brutal to watch. #7 DePaul against #10 Dayton. This game had it all in the negative.
Bad shooting. Poor freethrow shooting. Bad officiating. Bad decisions on the court.
The numbers are staggering. Dayton shot 34.2%, and was a pathetic 3-20 from 3-point land. Their free throw shooting was a stunning 52% (12-23). DePaul was only marginally better. They shot 40.7% and made 23-40 free throws. DePaul had one player go 10-10 at the line, and another who was 0-10. By the start of the second overtime, both teams were just shambling up and down the court.
I will be shocked if DePaul has anything left to throw at UConn on Saturday.
