First of all, check out this little McSmarty who picked the correct Sweet Sixteen on his bracket for the ESPN Tournament Challenge. He’s in first place, out of the more than 3-and-a-half million people who took the Challenge. Doesn’t even have cable, just did his research.

I did the ESPN bracket challenge, too. I’m in about 2,987,489th place.

But I’m starting from scratch with the Sweet Sixteen. Here goes.

1) Tennessee Defeats Louisville

Why? ‘Cause I like Bruce Pearl’s wardrobe, that’s why.

2) Memphis Defeats Michigan State

I think Memphis is the Number 1 seed that won’t make it to the Final Four. Why? The law of averages. They’ve only lost 1 game this year. It’s time to lose, guys.

I’ll give ‘em this one, because Michigan State has been super flaky this year. But they’re not gettin’ by Texas after. . .

3) Texas Defeats Stanford

I waffled on this one a little, but I keep coming up with Texas winning it. And if Stanford does win it, Memphis doesn’t get by them, either.

4) UCLA Defeats Western Kentucky

The Western Kentucky Whatevers are like lambs to slaughter. Not. Even. Close.

5) Xavier Defeats West Virginia

Because I picked them to.

6) North Carolina (Yawn) Defeats Washington State

But I don’t think I can take much more of the waxing poetic about the Tarheels and their balls-of-brass leader, “Psycho T.”

7) I Really Want Davidson to Win

So I’m picking them to beat Wisconsin. But the buck will have to stop there. Because they’ll have to play the Jayhawks after. . .

Kansas Defeats Villanova

Payback is a . . . well, you know.

North Carolina sails past Washington State, while Tennessee edges Louisville. While I’d love to see Tennessee beat North Carolina, I don’t think it’s gonna happen.

I already said that I’m not going to jinx my Jayhawks by making assumptions about KU beating Villanova and then Davidson (getting one more game out of their Cinderella run with a win over Wisconsin), but I’m definitely predicting both as Jayhawk victories. The Jayhawks are so deep and such a complete team that I don’t see either team keeping them from the Final Four. But I can tell you this: if Davidson was in any other region other than ours, I’d be cheering like crazy for them to get to the Final Four.

What I’m really hoping to see is the media-favored Tarheels going down at the hands of the Jayhawks in the Final Four. Now THAT would/will be a game.

And I can just see the T-Shirts on KU Fans: “We still don’t give a s**t about North Carolina”

In the South, I’m predicting that Texas gets past Stanford and Memphis gets past Michigan State. Then Texas beats Memphis. Yep.

UCLA doesn’t have much to worry about in the West. They should beat Western Kentucky, and then either Xavier or West Virginia (I’m leaning toward Xavier to beat WVa.).

So I’m sticking with my original Final Four: North Carolina, KU, Texas and UCLA. And I’m still predicting an all-Big 12 Final, with KU beating Texas in the championship game.

As predicted. Now the Jayhawks face 12-seed Villanova next weekend in the third round. That looks good on paper. But this is March and I’m not gonna jinx my ‘Hawks by making assumptions.

All is right in the state of Kansas. Not only did KU win, but the KState Beasleys lost to Wisconsin, in a game that was never really in question after half-time. Early in the day, before the games began, commentators were gushing fantastic about how Michael Beasley and Bill Walker were capable of carrying the Wildcats into the Final Four. Anyway.

KState’s brush with greatness is over. Beasley can start looking for a condo in Miami.

And then there was the one who got away from KState. After leaving KState at the altar last year, Bob Huggins went to West Virginia, where his Mountaineers sent Duke packing, and punched themselves a ticket to the Sweet Sixteen.

Stanford beat Marquette in OT yesterday, with their coach watching from the locker room after being ejected after two technicals.

Texas A&M ALMOST killed their giant. But UCLA squeaked by them with a 4-point win, after being down by as much as 10. It would have busted my bracket completely, since I have UCLA in the Final Four, but I wouldn’t have minded seeing Turgeon’s boys pull out the win. I like what Turgeon did at Wichita State, and think he’s headed in the right direction at A&M. Plus he’s a former Jayhawk. What’s not to love?

And speaking of giant-killers, how about Davidson? Took down the mighty G-Town Hoyas today. I’ll be lovin’ these guys until KU has to face them in the Elite 8. Until then…

Stephen Curry, will you marry my daughter?

Like Belmont should’ve done Duke yesterday.

Jim Calhoun suffered his first 1st-round NCAA tournament loss as the Huskies coach. At the press conference after the game, he found about a thousand ways to say that his 4-seeded Huskies gave the game to 13-seeded San Diego by playing crappy defense.

Not very gracious. Looked to me like San Diego handled their business.

And that wasn’t the only upset in Tampa today. The 12-seeded Western Kentucky upset 5-seeded Drake.

That means UCLA, if (when) they get past Mississippi State, will face either a 12-seed or a 13-seed in the Sweet 16. Can’t get much sweeter than that for the Bruins. Although

THEN, 13-seeded Siena upset 4-seed Vanderbilt.

By nature, I’m a fan of underdogs, and I love games like these because they put the Mad in March. I can’t even feel too bad about my brackets being all busted up. Cause no one else in the family pool picked all those upsets, so we’re all in the same boat. (I’m sure there’s some geek out there who figured each of those upsets through some mathematical probability matrix or something.)

Now, we’ve got 5-seeded Clemson playing 12-seeded Villanova. In Tampa. And guess who’s ahead? Riiiiiight… Villanova’s up 56-55 with 8:24 left in the game.

Other news while I’m waiting to see if higher seeds are cursed in Tampa. North Carolina put up 113 points on Mt. St. Mary’s. The good news for the Mount, though, is that they actually scored 74 points.

Total dominance by Texas, Tennessee, and Memphis in their games.

The 10-seeded Davidson beat 7-seeded Gonzaga, which is an upset, but not a huge upset. The big news is that Davidson’s baby-faced point guard Stephen Curry (ESPN refers to him as “the guard the big schools didn’t want”) hit 40 points (read it and weep, Michael Beasley). He strapped his team to his back and carried them into the second round, where they’ll face – yikes! – Georgetown. Well, whatever. Davidson might not have an answer for Roy Hibbert, but Georgetown better have an answer for Mr. Curry or it might not matter.

In other news, Indiana fell to Arkansas. Not an upset. But you have to feel for Hoosier nation. After the Kelvin Sampson mess, the new guy, Dan Dakich, steps in and still gets the team into the tournament. Then, what does the University do? They announce this week that they’re putting together a search committee for a new head coach. That’s just bad mojo.

Back Villanova and Clemson. Clemson at the free throw line with 1:55 to go. Ties it up at 66-66. But Clemson’s James Mays just fouled out, following teammate Trevor Booker. So the Tigers’ leading scorers are on the bench. Ouch.

Villanova’s Scottie Reynolds has been the MAN. Not to mention, this has been one hell of a comeback for Villanova: Clemson had been up 36-18 at one point.

Villanova’s up 70-66, with 59 seconds left. Villanova’s got the ball. Missed shot. Rebound Clemson. Clemson misses a 3-ball, and Sykes goes for the tip-in instead of the rebound, but Villanova ends up with the rebound. Clemson foul, Villanova at the free-throw line. James Mays has tears in his eyes — makes ME want to cry, too. ‘Nova makes both free throws and the score is 72-66. Clemson’s Ogilsvie misses on two 3-point attempts. Villanova rebound and another foul. One foul shot made. Villanova up 73-66. Clemson finally sinks a 3-ball with 7 seconds left, and the score is 73-69. Villanova inbounds, Clemson fouls and puts Villanova at the line once again. Two more free throws made by Villanova.

Game over.

History made in Tampa, as four lower seeds move on. Brackets busted everywhere.

Any my Jayhawks, if/when they get past UNLV, will be in the same position as UCLA, facing either a 12- or a 13-seed in the Sweet Sixteen. I said before that it can’t get much sweeter than that, but the other side of that coin is this: any team that makes it to the Sweet Sixteen is for real, and all bets are off.

That’s why I love this tournament.

Yes, hubby got his bracket done. He’s got KU, UCLA, Texas and Louisville (hahahahahahahahaha) in the Final Four, with KU beating UCLA in the championship.

My basketball day started when I watched the KU game at my desk. I’ve got a double monitor, so I had the game going on one screen, while I worked on the other. After a few minutes, I just kept the corner of my eye on what was obviously gonna be a KU victory. Looks like their next match-up will be against UNLV on Saturday.

Otherwise, I just kept track of the afternoon scores. And then went to work out.

By the time I got home. . .

The KState Beasleys were pulling away from USC in the second half. They ended up with a convincing enough victory, in which Beasley scored his 27th double-double of the season. His brilliance in the service of the Wildcat Nation is futile, though. I’d advise Wildcat fans not too read too much into this win.While watching the Michael Beasley show, we’d been keeping track of the Duke game via the helpful little score-trackers at the top of the screen, and the big news was that Duke was in a neck-and-neck nailbiter with Belmont. Once the Wildcats had their game in hand, CBS switched to the Duke/Belmont game.

You may remember that I have a little bias against Duke, which is pretty much in proportion to the media bias FOR Duke. So I was really pulling for the underdog Belmont Whatevers, (even though I picked Duke in my brackets as a practical matter).

Wouldn’t it just be the case that Duke would pull it out, though. That darn Gerald Henderson got himself a coast-to-coast drive at the end o the game. The Other Guys had the same opportunity, but couldn’t pull it off. They got the big game heebie-jeebies.

The Duke win is good for my brackets, but bad for my sense of righteousness.

THEN: UCLA destroyed Mississippi Valley State. When UCLA was up by 37-12, I swear I heard Greg Gumbel say “If UCLA holds on and wins this game, they’ll face Texas A&M on Saturday” ????????? Well, hold on, they did. The final score was 70-29. How is it even possible to only score 29 points in the NCAA tournament?

Don’t answer that. . .

George Mason got beat by Notre Dame. The Mason loss messed me up a little bit in the brackets, and that’s what I get for trying to pick an upset. My usual policy is to stay away from upset picks, but GM had a little recent history going for them in this regard. I think I’ll stick with my policy next year.

Early in the second half, Cal-State Fullerton was rolling right along with Wisconsin, in a nip-and-tuck game. The KState Wildcats were on site, scouting. And praying that Wisconsin bites the dust. The Badgers (what a mascot) widened the gap to 10 points, though, with about 12 minutes to go, and managed to keep a healthy distance for the rest of the game. Bummer for the Travelling Beasleys.

The West Virginia Mountaineers beat the Arizona wildcats, 75-65. They’ll move on to play the Duke Blue Devils. My bracket says Duke will survive another one and then go down at the hands of Xavier in the third round.

As I wrap up this post, I’ll just note that the local Kansas City CBS station is treating us to the very unlovely sight of about a MILLION drunk KState Fans celebrating their victory by screaming and jumping around some bar. How excited they all are! They’re talking about how they want another match-up with KU in the Elite 8. But, hello? Did you all forget you’re in the NCAA tournament? Wisconsin and Georgetown are there to play. Let’s worry about one game at a time, Kitties. Meow.