March Madness: Day 1

Opening day for the NCAA Tournament.

Game/Upset of the day:
West Region:
#11 Virginia Commonwealth 79
#6 Duke 77
Great game with about as good as an ending as you can hope for. This thriller kept me on the edge of my seat during the first upset of the tournament. At one point, in the first half VCU was down 22-9. Great perimeter shooting and defense brought VCU back. During the final minutes there were several lead changes and ties. Also a rough game, as four Duke players had to leave the game because of bleeding. Scary moment late in the game when Duke guard Scheyer was unintentionally hit by a VCU player drove to the basket and bled from the eye. This looked like a follow through hit a la Kobe, but fortunately Scheyer was fine and able to return to the game. Congratulations to the rams and first year coach Anthony Grant to pull off the upset against the Blue Devils, who had a disappointing season. This is the first time the Blue Devils have fallen in the first round, and this is the lowest they had been seeded in quite a while. This also breaks the streak of Sweet 16 appearances at 9, what was the nations longest active streak.

Stat of the day:
In an extremely low scoring game between #9 Michigan State 61 and #8 Marquette 49, the Golden Eagles failed to score until 10:46 remaining in the first quarter. Not a big deal, but I wanted to see Dominic James lead his team into the Sweet 16.

Also:
#2 UCLA 70
#15 Weber State 42
UCLA dominated Weber (pronounced wee-bur) State, Head Coach Ben Howland's alma mater as expected. Nice bounce back after a disappointing loss to mediocre Yoo-Dub in the regular season finale and not much better Golden Bears in their opening game in the PAC-10 tournament. Look for Bruins to make a deep run in the tournament.
Collison's mildly sprained ankle seemed fine and he played at full throttle against the Wildcats.

My bracket:
As of 7:40, my bracket is pretty good. Only misses so far are Duke and Marquette.
99th Percentile in all of Yahoo! Tournament Pick'em Brackets.
Not too shabby.

Buzz of the day:
Jeff (Cleveland): I think I my bracket is busted already. That FAMU/Niagara game killed me.

Site of the day:
ESPN site offers animations and explanations of key plays for Florida, North Carolina, UCLA, and Wisconsin. Interesting, and give you something to watch for while watching their games.

What to watch right now (8:00 PM PST):
17:47 2nd Half
(10)Gonzaga 35
(7)Indiana 38
2CBS

UPDATE:
(10)Gonzaga 57
(7)Indiana 70
Indiana advances to meet UCLA in the second round.