March Madness begins (day 2)

Saturday:

Virginia has had the most dramatic shifts of fate in recent years. In 2018, they suffered humiliation when they became the first #1 seed to lose a first-round match to a #16. In 2019, they basked in elation when they won the whole shebang. There was no tournament in 2020, so they entered the 2021 tournament as the defending champions. Given the up-and-down pattern that I began this paragraph with, you can guess what happened Saturday. As a #4 seed, they were upset by 13th-seeded Ohio.

Perhaps that wasn’t as severe a comeuppance as suffered by the Texas Longhorns, a #3 seed ranked in the top ten in the national polls, that lost to unheralded Abilene Christian.

Tale of the tape for the Longhorns’ coach:

What a thrill for the 5,000-student school to defeat the big dog of their own state (50,000 students) after falling behind early. Don’t underestimate Abilene. They play in a weak conference, but they destroyed their opponent in the conference championship game (79-45) after easily rolling over every other team they faced in the tourney. These kids got some game, and they have really peaked at the right time.

Saturday summary

Friday:

Ohio State, second-seeded and ranked #7 in the nation, dropped a close OT game to … wait for it … 15th-seeded Oral Roberts.

The other institutions in the fine family of Roberts colleges, Anal and Genital, did not advance.

Also advancing in upsets:

• 11-seed Syracuse won easily
• 12-seed Oregon won easily
• 13-seed North Texas won in OT

Friday summary