Here's the link to this year's ESPN Tournament Challenge!

The group name is Officials Forum. It's a private group, the password is whistle.

May the best poster win!

http://games.espn.go.com/tcmen/frontpage

Do we have a chance to win a portion of the same pot Rick Neuheisel is in? :D

I'm pretty sure I was in the ladder half of the standings last year... looking to do better this year! :)

Was it an extension ladder? A folding ladder? Wood or aluminum? Just curious. Maybe you can climb up it to get higher in the standings this year. :D

Just signed in, past performance is no guarantee of future results.

I will do my best to defend my crown from last year. That being said, I am hoping for a top 20 finish this year, since my picking (guessing) ability is suspect at best most days. :D

Well if I recall correctly, I believe it was probably a step ladder. But hey, any type of jump start can't hurt!

Thanks Tony! I'm in...and I'm currently tied for First Place!! Whooo-hooo!!! That won't last much past the first few hours of the tournament...

Umm...Tony, since I'm currently also tied for first along with the guy that picked Seattle (of all teams) to win the Super Bowl, I guess that gives me a little room to talk smack. So, here goes:

Mr. Spelling Guy asked me to pass this along to you - the word "in" is spelled i<B>n</B>, not i<B>t</B>. ;)

What are you talking about? :confused:

mick, anyway to pin this thread to the top of the board?

At the top of the ESPN Officials Forum Group Page, you put a well-known quote under the title.

Get it?

Leave it to me to find the mucous on the end of the nose...

Ouch...it's ok tho, because I have been to my hypnotherapist so many times that she can regress me by phone now...so I just gave her a call and now I don't even remeber what we were talking about...

im in
 

but i know squat about college bball

I have been to my hypnotherapist so many times that she can regress me by phone now[/B][/QUOTE]Oooooooooo, phone regress.

I heard about that. Saw it in one of those infomercials that they play in the middle of the night when the kids are in bed.

Whatever floats your boat.......

Oooooooooo, phone regress.

I heard about that. Saw it in one of those infomercials that they play in the middle of the night when the kids are in bed.

Whatever floats your boat....... [/B][/QUOTE]

Shutup

Brad can.
I am enuched.

I'm not sure what that is, but it's gotta be better than being eunuched. :eek:

The strangest thing about the word "eunuch" is that it derives from Greek. And in Greek, the prefix "eu" means "good". Go figure.

Yer right again.
Very good !

<i>"enuched"</i> only involves <b>one</b> nut.

<i>"Euneched"</i> involves <b>both</b> nuts, or in some unusual case, three nuts.

Iow, one is singular and the other is plural. In mick's case, the "singular" is applicable(poor lad).

Now, you should thank Mick for teaching you something today, Chuck.

Thank you, Mick.

ESPN's tournament bracket software sucks. Yahoo's is much better, and I'll organize a bracket there if anyone wants to play there.

I've always enjoyed ESPN's bracket. I've never had any problems and have always enjoyed the experience.

Luckily, they joined the EU. :)

But ESPN prints better, ...and you get that extra zero on your score.
I play both.
I still need a life. [img]//www.deephousepage.com/smilies/nope.gif[/img]
mick

Don't ask me why, but I'm in.

Why are you in?

Because he wants to be part of the "in" crowd. Peer pressure can be a dangerous thing.

Are you in or out?

I'm on the bubble.

I can't wait to hear Billy Packer's opinion on if you're in or out.

What's being "on the bubble" mean anyway? Is there some great big, bubble someplace that's strong enough to hold people?

Methinks something is out of whack here.

Wait a minute......

What's a "whack"? :confused:

I think Lawrence Welk invented bubbles. And he was good at picking the seedings, too (ah 1, and ah 2...).
I'm not sure...

So, if you're out of whack, then am I in whack? :confused:

I am in.

The odds of me getting the best score and doing worse than I did last year are about the same.

That's what you say when you eject Sheed from the game... or what you say when you really want to confuse some lousy JuCo player who don't know squat about basketball... or it's what's going to happen to my score after about the fourth game of the tournament.

Thay help ya any???

32

Game on!!!

NCAA Pickem
 

I am in. Good luck everyone

Your brackets are dumb.
 

BktBallRef,
I have to choose between the Heels and Spartans way too early.
I am quite disappointed.
Please change that for next year. Geez !
mick

Re: Your brackets are dumb.
 

mick, looks to me like they intentionally moved Tennessee into that #2 seed so that UNC and MSU would be potentially matched in the 2nd round. :(

How many teams from your state?
 

Does anyone have more than 5 teams?

Re: Your brackets are dumb.
 

All complaints need to be forwarded to:

Craig Littlepage - University of Virginia Athletic Dept. 434-982-5100 Chairman of the NCAA Selection Committee. He's the one that couldn't rein in those mid-major representatives who took over the selection process.

Tom Izzo - Michigan State University Men's Head Basketball Coach. [email protected] He's the one responsible for not being able to beat Illinois during the regular season.

:fanboy on:
Go Illini!
:fanboy off:

Re: Re: Your brackets are dumb.
 

M&M,
Wasn't Izzo.
It was Dee Brown and Paul Davis. http://www.deephousepage.com/smilies/nixweiss.gif

Re: Re: Re: Your brackets are dumb.
 

What?

The games are decided by the players, not the coaches and officials?

mick, that's what I like about you, that "ouside the box" thinking. ;)

Next year we gotta think about the winner earning a prize.

Pools are so much better when there's a prize to be won.

Please read. Looks like an Official Forum directive.
 

http://www.officialforum.com/announcement.php?forumid=3

TH - Thanks for the change on the page. Some of us anal-retentive people can now sleep easier... :D

(Only 19 hrs. to the start of the best time of year!)

I'm in

Geez !
 

<font size = +6>82</font>


Wow !!!
I will consider it a success to have my score on the 1st page !
Yikes!! :eek:
mick

Well...
 

Hopefully I'll come out on top this time around, but if I don't, I guess the easiest thing to do is blame it on the refs! :D ;)

Re: Geez !
 

Hey mick, I'm leading!!!!! :D

They used to limit groups to 50....glad everyone is able to get in!

Re: Re: Geez !
 

I see that! Attaboy!
You could well be there until the end of the 2nd round!
Good job!

<Font color = Green size = +6>Go Spartans !!</Font>
mick

I'm in the lead! (For now - 2:55 PM EST)

<font color = orange>Go Illini!</font>

(Damn, that looks more like Texas orange than Illini orange. To which moderator do I direct my complaint?)

That would be Mark T.

DAMMIT NevadaRef!
 

Your guys are killing me out there! :mad:

I'm going to brag now, before it all goes to hell.

7-0 baby!

Good job.

Me?

I'm still on the first page! :D

Well, I'm 5-2 and I'm listed on the bottom of the second page. :confused:

Still at 100% - first time I had time to check in on that today, and I'm quite pleased. It'll be changing though, 'cause my impossible upset was Iona over LSU, which doesn't look to be going my way... also the Zags are in tougher than I hoped, and GW and Wilmington are going through a tight one. Look for me to drop...

Snaqwells falls from the ranks of the undefeated.

Currently, according to ESPN (which is behind), I'm 8-1 and there are over 20K people 9-0. Tough crowd.

-------------------------------------

Right now (9:41PM CST) looks like there are 7 of us that are 11-1. There are 10797 entries that are 12-0. Jeez.

It's early, but there's no better days than day 1 and 2 of the Big Dance!

I demand a recount.

Day 1 Results
 

j.cortese leads The Official Forum with a 15 win day.

6 entries had 14 wins, 6 entires had 13 wins, and 22 entries had 12 wins.

To be guaranteed a spot on the first page, you needed 12 wins.

1140 entries nationwide picked all 16 games correctly yesterday. Some freak will get all 63 games right.

18335 entries had at least 15 wins.

123177 entries had at least 14 wins.

473507 entries had at least 13 wins.

1,207,989 entries had at least 12 wins.

There were about 2.7 million total entries.

With 63 games in the tournament, there are 9.22337204 × 10 ^ 18 unique brackets. This number is 9.22 quintillion.

To count this high, you would need to count a number each second for 2.92471209 × 10 ^ 11 years (.3 trillion years).

With just 2.7 million entries, the odds of someone hitting a perfect bracket is 1 in 3.41606372 × 10 ^ 12, or 1 in 3.4 trillion.

How many games should be assumed to go according to Hoyle such that 1 of the 2.7 million is guaranteed to pick a perfect bracket? (Or, 2 ^ # games = 2.7 million.) That number is 21: 2 ^ 21 (2 097 152). IOW, there must be 42 games according to Hoyle so that it really is only a pick of the toughest 21 games.

This made my head hurt. And I haven't even had any green beer yet....

Re: How many teams from your state?
 

BBR that is just cruel and wrong, here in Wyoming we don't have any teams, and now the Mountain West is out, and nothing in the region except for Montana wooo hoooooo go Grizzzzzzz......but hey Wyoming was just a couple plays away from taking a losing record to the big dance baby....

Syracuse.
Aggie gaggy.
Ugh !
http://www.clicksmilies.com/s0105/sp...smiley-002.gif

Not a great first round for me. Fortunately, 13 of my Sweet 16 are still alive and 7 of my Elite 8. So I can make a charge. . .

I was riding Iowa. Not good times. :(

I had 14 the first day and only 10 the second day.

But like Chuck, I have 13 of 16 Sweet Sixteen left and unlike Chuck, I have all my elite eight teams.

Still wish Albany would've held on last night. About time a 16 beats a 1.

Re: Day 1 Results
 

Nope. The two players tied for first have both missed one game. One missed the Iowa game, the other missed the Syracuse game. I wonder how many brackets these guys filled out.

Last year's winner picked 55 games correctly.

Re: Re: Day 1 Results
 

I totally think it's possible that someone will go 63 fer 63.

There are a helluva lot more pools around that just ESPN.

I'm with you, Chuck. I'm still on the fist page, but that won't last long. I'm out 5 sweet 16 teams and 2 Elite 8 teams. Oh well, not a good year.

Re: Re: Re: Day 1 Results
 

I'd be happy to end up 63rd.
I am ready for the Dookies to disappear.
Go Heels.

Re: Re: Re: Re: Day 1 Results
 

Watch the blaspheming Mick!

What time is the UNC v. Mich St. errr, I mean George Mason game tomorrow ;)

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Day 1 Results
 

<font size = 6 color = red> Aaaarrrrgh !!</font>
(11) George Mason vs. (3) North Carolina, 4:50 p.m.

Go Heels !

Is next-to-last a good thing?

Well, if only 2 are playing, it ain't bad.

Many pools that I enter have a get-your-money-back prize if you are last.

So, you'd almost get your money back.

YU.P., yU.P. :)

Woohooo!

I've moved up to #32 in the group!

And I'm now ranked 607320 overall!

Life is good.

:D

We must be tied as that rank looks familiar.

After today I'll feel pretty good if I have all my elite 8 teams remaining. The first two rounds are rarely the ones that win the tourney, although they can make it hard to win.

Update before the Final Four
 

Ok heading into the Final Four:
R. Gaudreau sits in 1st place with 790 points.
He wins if LSU beats UCLA.

However, he has no more possible points. Only four entrants have possible points remaining.

a. LongIslandZebra wins it, if George Mason beats UCLA for the national title.

b. Nevadaref can't win it. 3rd is best possible finish.

c. Whistles & Stripes can't win it. Only top 20 finish is possible.

d. s. hardage is the wild card. Has UCLA vs. Florida in the championship game. He wins if both teams get there no matter which one wins. If George Mason beats Florida, then he needs UCLA to win the championship to claim the top spot.

Wow
 

I've been so concerned with my one money pool, that I haven't looked at this one since the 2nd day of the Tourney...and now I see that I'm in second place! How sweet it is! BTW, was anyone in the 440 people on ESPN that picked GM to win the NC?

As miserable as my bracket has been, I'll take whatever I can scrape together at this point. I was just happy to see that I had moved up to Page 1 yesterday. :D

I'm #14 in the group - current rank is 296189!! Better than lst year!

Today my rank is like 1575888.

That's a lot of people to be after!

One of the ESPN radio shows aid there are 4 brackets left out of 3 million with all of the Final Four participants picked correctly. [Mine is not one of them. Just thought I would let you know.]

One of those brackets if from a guy in Nebraska. He thought he was picking George Washington LOL

<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=1 width="100%"><TBODY><TR><TD vAlign=top>March madness, and some luck, too
BY DIRK CHATELAIN

</TD><TD vAlign=top></TD></TR><TR><TD vAlign=top colSpan=2>http://www.omaha.com/c_images/fills/black.gif

</TD></TR><TR><TD class=ftr colSpan=2>WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
Russell Pleasant holds the secret to deciphering the madness. Mark this down for next year. The 46-year-old from Bellevue, somewhat of a national celebrity by now, has this tip for the millions of NCAA bracket code breakers looking for a Cinderella:
<TABLE cellSpacing=1 cellPadding=0 width=210 align=left><TBODY><TR><TD>http://www.omaha.com/imglib/mainsite...ahpleasant.jpg </TD><TD width=10 rowSpan=2></TD></TR><TR><TD class=owhPhotoCaptionBg><TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=10 width=200><TBODY><TR><TD class=owhPhotoCaption>Russell Pleasant, 46, of Bellevue, with his son Russell Jr., 14, and daughter Ashley, 15, along with his winning bracket on a laptop computer.</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
"Why not George Mason?" Pleasant says.
Thanks to George Mason's improbable run to the Final Four, Pleasant is on the verge of winning $10,000 in an ESPN.com NCAA "Tournament Challenge."
Of the 3 million brackets ESPN received, only four correctly picked all of the Final Four teams. Competitors were allowed to submit as many as five entries.
Of the four ESPN finalists, Pleasant stands alone at the top, at least for now. Of a possible 1,680 points, Pleasant has 1,660. He's missed about five games in the whole tournament.
"I guess I'm like everybody else," Pleasant said. "I really want to jump on the bandwagon with the Cinderella, but I also want to win."
Pleasant's chances of winning most likely rest on George Mason's losing to Florida on Saturday in the national semifinals.
Pleasant chose Florida to beat UCLA in the national title game. But George Mason was the shocker of his bracket when he completed it two weeks ago. He figured his chances of winning a pool increased if he picked an obscure team.
Luck played a part. Pleasant temporarily confused George Mason with George Washington when selecting his winners. When he noticed the mix-up, he decided to leave his picks alone.
And he remembered that Creighton had played George Mason back in November; the Jays won by 20. That didn't deter Pleasant from selecting the Patriots.
"I've been looking at a lot of teams throughout the year and putting it in the back of my mind," Pleasant said.
George Mason, a No. 11 seed, had never even won an NCAA tournament game before beating Michigan State, North Carolina, Wichita State and Connecticut. The Patriots, of Fairfax, Va., barely made the field of 65. Put it this way: They weren't exactly on Dick Vitale's radar screen.
Prognosticating the NCAA tournament, like trimming the family Christmas tree or lighting Fourth of July sparklers in the backyard, has become a national tradition. But the intoxicating part of March Madness lies in its inability to be predicted. Buzzer beaters are the norm; no school, no matter the tradition, is safe from heartbreak.
Connecticut, Duke, Kansas and Villanova were the popular names when amateur and professional analysts picked their Final Fours two weeks ago. None of them lasted as long as George Mason.
Pleasant, a software test engineer at CSG Systems Inc., grew up a Husker fan in Omaha and always followed college basketball closely. He entered his first office pool a year ago. He didn't win. This time around, he decided to enter the ESPN pool.
He knew he was doing well in the pool when he arrived at the office Monday. He didn't expect to sit alone in first place, though.
"Right when I pulled it up on the screen, my phone rang," Pleasant said.
The New York Times, ABC News and ESPN are just a few who dialed his number. He was scheduled to shoot the breeze with Woody Paige today on ESPN's "Cold Pizza." Pleasant's five kids may even see him on "Good Morning, America" this week.
If Pleasant wins, he'll use the money to pay a few bills. And he might just buy a George Mason T-shirt.

Well, I'm currently in 1st place in this pool. But I have absolutely no one left in my bracket... so if anyone has any of the final four teams in there left, chance are you'll sneak ahead of me between now and Monday.

Ren

Cheer hard for LSU on Saturday. If they win, you win the pool.

1. Of a possible 1,680 points, Pleasant has 1,660. He's missed about five games in the whole tournament.

2. Luck played a part. Pleasant temporarily confused George Mason with George Washington when selecting his winners.

3. Pleasant, a software test engineer at CSG Systems Inc., grew up a Husker fan in Omaha and always followed college basketball closely. He entered his first office pool a year ago. He didn't win. This time around, he decided to enter the ESPN pool.


1. Ok, let's set this straight. First the author of the article has no clue about college basketball either. He didn't even do enough research to get the points in the contest correct. Right now, Mr. Pleasant has 1060 points out of a possible 1280 through the first four rounds. There are 1680 points possible in the entire event. If Mr. Pleasant is correct on the final three games he will finish with 1460 not 1660. BTW so far he has missed 13 games by my count.

2. He has "always followed college basketball closely", yet he doesn't know George Mason from George Washington. :rolleyes:

3. Last year was his first time filling out brackets? :confused: Did he follow college basketball from a cave? This is not a new phenomenon.

Please let someone else win this thing!

So the writer flunked remedial math. What's the big deal? ;)

I had Duke, UNC and BC in the Final Four. Three ACC teams in the Final Four. Wait a minute. . . I just filled out the wrong bracket!! I meant to fill out the Women's bracket!! Three ACC teams in the Final Four? I'm on a roll, baby!!

I filled out 2 ESPN Brackets. One was with this group which I have 700 points.
My other braket has 840 points and has 2 final four teams (UCLA & Florida). I had 6 of 8 in the Elite Eight (I had N.Carolina & Duke). Can I trade in that bracket? :D

OK, I Admit it, I filled out a WOMEN's bracket too. Got 3 of 4 correct. I picked all the #1 seeds to make it to the FF. 7948th place, in the 95th percentile. I should stick to picking women's games.

Actually, you can. As far as I know you are allowed to leave or join groups as you please and you can have more than one bracket in the same group if you like.

Unless Tony was smart and put the lock group feature on. Once the games start on the first day, you can't join or leave locked groups.

Well, it's official now. Congrats to S Hardage, the champ of the group. He's the only one in our group that correctly picked the final 2 teams, and that seemed to do it for him.

As for me, I'll take my dismal 17th place finish, which I rode UCLA into the final to get there from somewhere in the 60s earlier.

Oh well. As a lifetime Cubs fan, I'm very familiar with the mantra, "THere's always next year."

I came up just a bit short. look forward to next year!!