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.

The first order of business is to congratulate Mt. St. Mary’s for winning the play-in game. In defeating Coppin State, the Mountaineers move on to play North Carolina on Friday night. I feel for you, guys. But enjoy the big dance while you can.

Meanwhile, the family bracketology competition is set.

Snacky’s attempt to get Grandpa barred from the family bracket competition this year was unsuccessful. However, he’s determined to take back the championship. He pointed out that Grandpa only beat him last year by one point, after all, because Grandpa picked Florida to win it all. Snacky says this as if picking Florida represented some insidious form of bracket cheating. But, please understand that poor Snacky was handicapped by his still unexplained hatred of Florida, which resulted in a refusal beyond reason to project them as champions in HIS bracket. So Grandpa rode destiny’s train to the jackpot, and Snacky has been stewing ever since.

(I will note here that Anthony pointed out that Snacky did his brackets all in PENCIL this year. And there have been accusations in the past of eraser marks on certain brackets during the course of the tournament. I guess I’ll take them all to work and make copies. Lots of intrigue surrounds our bracket competition.)

Now, to the point. I know you’re all dying to hear my family’s predictions for the Final Four. Unfortunately, the only ones I have in my possession as of this writing are Snacky’s, Anthony’s and my own. The hubby has been warned that he has to fill out a bracket tomorrow before he leaves for work. No way he gets to waltz in the door at the end of the day with a bracket. Grandma and grandpa are currently in possession of their brackets at their house. I trust them, though — even if Snacky doesn’t.

Quentin should be home any time now, and I’ll have her fill one out just for fun. We usually get a good laugh at her bracket since she doesn’t know anything about basketball. One year, though, she shut us all up by coming in second. Go figure.

Anyway, back to the heavyweight bracketmasters of bracketology. Here’s what we’ve got, and we’ve all got two brackets working.

Snacky’s Bracket #1: He’s got Memphis, UCLA, North Carolina and Kansas in his Final Four. He’s picking UCLA and North Carolina in the championship game, with North Carolina winning it all.

Snacky’s Bracket #2: This is where he shows he’s not a total traitor to KU. He has Texas, UCLA, North Carolina and Kansas in the Final Four. Kansas and UCLA meet up in the championship, with KU winning.

Anthony’s Bracket #1: Exactly the same as Snacky’s #1 bracket, except with UCLA beating North Carolina in the championship game.

Anthony’s Bracket #2: Memphis, UCLA, North Carolina and Georgetown in the Final Four. North Carolina and Memphis meet up in the championship game, and North Carolina wins.

Ant’s not worried about whether we think he’s a traitor to KU. He’s a true bracketologist.

Mom’s Bracket #1: North Carolina, KU, Texas and UCLA in the Final Four. KU meets UCLA in the championship game and gets some payback for last year.

Mom’s Bracket #2: North Carolina, KU, Texas and UCLA in the Final Four. This time KU gets to beat Texas again.

Update: Quentin just got home and filled out one bracket, with Anthony’s help: she’s go UCLA, KU, North Carolina and Memphis. KU and UCLA are going to the championship and KU is winning.

Stay tuned to see if the hubby gets his bracket done before work tomorrow.

Also, plenty of commentary to come as the games begin!

The brackets for the men’s NCAA Tournament are out today, and so begins our annual tradition of inter-family gambling. We all fill out 1, or 2, but no more than 2, brackets each and enter them in the family pool at a cost of 5 dollars per bracket. At the end of the tournament, it’s winner take all.

Snacky had been the reigning 3-year family bracket champion until last year, when we let my parents in the pool. Grandpa stole his thunder by winning the pot with a bracket he filled out in about 5 minutes — with his eyes closed. Snacky is trying to get Grandpa barred from our family pool this year, but is garnering NO support for this shady back-door political move.

So we’ll get our brackets filled out and I’ll report on our final four picks.

In the meantime, here’s what’s upcoming.

Day One: Tuesday, March 18

The first game to be played in the NCAA Men’s tournament is the play-in game, to be held Tuesday night. Coppin State(16-20) will play Mount St. Mary’s (18-14) for the privilege of playing the role of cannon fodder for Number 1 seed North Carolina. Good luck, fellas.

In between Ant’s first two tournament games, we headed over to a restaurant in the Casino complex next to the gym the team was playing in to watch the second half of the KU game. It was the closest place, and our folks weren’t going to miss any more of the game than they had to. So we sat in this restaurant that smelled like the smoke leaking out of the casino, which was pretty well packed on a Saturday afternoon, and eating a pretty mediocre meal while we watched our Jayhawks lose to the Ok State Cowboys. Bummer.

My overriding thought during the game was that the Jayhawks will need to have a couple of things go very differently to make a deep tournament run this year.

To begin with, Darrell Arthur needs to stay out of foul trouble and stay in the game, preferably for at least 30 minutes — we need our best big guy. Our ‘Hawks also need to be more consistent with both making AND defending the three-ball. It might not hurt to deploy a 3-2 zone at times, serving the dual purpose of intimidating shooters and potentially keeping Arthur out of foul trouble? Not that I’m gonna do too much second-guessing of a WINNING basketball coach who obviously knows his business much better than I do. . . but what’s the fun of watching a game if you can’t play arm-chair analyst?

Anyhow. . . the game only killed about half of the time we had between games, thanks to a poorly managed division schedule in our tournament. So we went to a mall after the game, and I managed to feel better after buying about $30.00 worth of different chocolate treats for the family (including a chocolate-covered twinkie that I decided I have to try).

I felt even better after we got back to the gym and Ant’s team won their game 56-30, sending them to the championship game.

And the good feelings just kept coming. . . after Ant’s game, I checked my phone and found a text message from Snacky. It said “KState Lost HaHa.” Turns out Baylor beat them 92-86. So at least I can rest assured that the kitties aren’t going to edge past us in any rankings.

But I’ll hand it to KState — they went out with a bang. Michael Beasley broke the record for freshman double-doubles previously held by Carmelo Anthony. Beasley now has 23. He scored 44 points, which is the most points scored ever in a Big 12 game. Beasley’s teammate, the highly expressive Bill Walker, scored 31 points.

If you’re adding, that means Beasley and Walker scored 75 out of 86 KState points. And they still lost. WOW. I’m not even sure how to comment on that, except to say that next year is going to be a GIANT buzz-kill for the Wildcat nation. I’ll also direct your attention to the fact that KState’s AD has resigned and is moving on. Hmmmmmm.

AND finally. . .

The big NCAA basketball news is that previously unbeaten Memphis is no longer unbeaten, thanks to the Tennessee Volunteers. Let’s face it: the fate of every unbeaten team is to get beaten. Of course, I missed that game completely because it was going on while mama’s baby was kickin ass — but I got to see the highlights.

Maybe not the coldest baller on the court, but still. . .

The man loves basketball . . . and plays basketball with a passion, from all accounts. This is the icing on the Obama cake for a woman with a basketball jones as big as mine.

I was already on board, but the basketball angle takes it to a whole new level. Because basketball is truly the most democratic of American sports. All you need is a court, a ball, some attitude and you’re ready to ball.  What this means is that a baller learns to respect everybody — cause you never know who can take you to the hole; who can take your cookies; or who can dunk on you.

I’ll trust a man who isn’t afraid to mix it up.

Here’s a good link to photos of Obama taking a basketball break from campaign life.

And note that the caption for photo #6 tells us that “between games, Obama describes his deep basketball jones.”

Did he say “basketball jones?”

Yeah, baby. I want a president who can take it to the rack!

I’ll add one more link to a good NY Times article about Obama and basketball, just for the enjoyment of my fellow basketball junkies.

Too hip to be true? I’ve been waiting since I was 18 years old to cast this vote.