March Madness 2021

Hey everyone, it’s March Madness time again.  All the details about the pool are in the attached document (how to enter, how to pay, deadlines, etc.), but there were some things that make this years pool quite a bit different from other years.  I wanted to go over those:

First, the games start on Friday this year instead of Thursday.  That means you have an extra day to get picks in.  As usual, the cutoff for entries is the tipoff of the first Round of 64 games.  Remember that there are “First 4” games that will go off on Thursday this year (as opposed to Tues/Wed in normal years).  You don’t have to pick those games.  You will get the winner of those games, regardless of who wins if you pick them to advance (details in the instructions).

There’s some fluidity in the bracket as well this year.  If, for some reason, a team from a multi-bid league becomes ineligible to play because of COVID, there are 4 teams waiting to take their place.  If the NCAA needs to do this, they will do it regardless of seeding.  So, if it turns out that there is an outbreak of COVID and Kansas can’t play, they will be replaced in the field by Louisville, but Louisville will still be playing Eastern Washington in the first round.  They aren’t re-seeding.

If a team from a one-bid league has an outbreak of COVID and can’t play, the league commissioner gets to pick a team from the conference to play.  So, if Eastern Washington can’t play, the commissioner of the Big Sky conference can tap Southern Utah to play instead.  Again, they won’t re-seed.

All of this is in motion until Tuesday.  After Tuesday, they are locking the bracket and no other changes will be allowed.  If a team gets an outbreak after Tuesday, they are just tossed out and the team they were supposed to be playing gets a bye.

So, that’s complicated, but it’s probably best to remember a few things:

-          Picks are due prior to tipoff on Friday.

-          The bracket is locked on Tuesday.

-          I’ll allow any changes to picks prior to Friday tipoff

So, if you want to enter right now and then change your entry if a team has to be swapped out or DQ’d, I can work with that.

I’m also attaching an Excel spreadsheet of the bracket to fill in.  I’ll accept entries in any format, but I transcribe the picks into one master spreadsheet for scoring, so it’s 1000X easier for me to do if you use the attached spreadsheet.  There are drop down picks and everything.

Like I said before, all the pertinent information is in the attached Word doc.  Feel free to forward this on to anyone that would like to play.  Enter as many times as you’d like and I hope to hear from all of you before Friday!!!

Good luck!  Go Aztecs!  Go Jackets!

Klei