At last .. we've been patiently waiting all year.

We're getting down to conference tournament time. Selection Sunday is March 15. Start thinking about your bracket picks!

My early favorite is Oklahoma; Gary's taking Pittsburgh.

Marc - are you backing UCLA this year? :D

Cheers, Anne

Go Gonzaga and Butler! C'mon #7 you gotta get some bracket busters...

Anne - you're a doll. Oklahoma all the way!! Both men and women. Boomer Sooner! I am so ready.

I haven't watched a single basketball game yet this year. I think I will probably do my normal Pac-10, West Coast, and Big 12 school choices.

Go Louisville!!

For those who have an iPhone or iTouch, there's a great new app called PocketBracket. It's 99 cents. For less than a dollar, it will keep track and score your brackets so you can easily compete against your friends.

Why does this sound like a commercial.. well, my Brother-in-Law developed the program with a few of his buddies. They are really excited and want to become iPhone app billionaires (99 cents at a time!)

So, if you go through your couch and can find 99 cents laying around, give it a try. And tell your friends if you think they might like it.

end of commercial!

THANKS!!!!! for helping a brother (in law) out.

Boomer Sooner, and my fingers are crossed. Mens and Womens teams.

Susan

As usual with us - we are about all things Wisconsin - so Marquette of course. I don't think the Badgers will even make it into the 64. :(

No matter what teams are in, I love March Madness!!!!!

We are starting with the Big East Women's tourney this weekend in Hartford.

We are glad to be in the bottom bracket this year as #6. We should make quarters and possibly semi finals (have to beat Pitt); if so, most likely we play Louisville. They would be tough for us. UConn women are in the top bracket and should they continue on their steam roller season, they'll be winning the finals - no matter who they play. We should make the NCAAs for the women this year - just a question of seeding - and the tournament record will come into play on that decision.

With the new Big East five day tournament format, the women's finals overlap with the first day of the men's 9-16 ranked team preliminary round next Tuesday. If we are in the women's final, our itinerary looks like this:

Get an early train from Hartford to Penn Station New York. Head to Mustang Sally's for the sports bar breakfast beer pre-game experience, then back to Madison Square for the noon game. Catch train back to Hartford, attend finals (7 or 8 pm start). If men win on Tuesday, up early and drive to NYC. Back to Mustang Sally's for more sports bar breakfast beers, and be in our seats for a noon tip off. Stay for second game, and hopefully get out of town before rush hour. Love the madness of the shifting sands of sports schedules!!

Bracket busters? Butler is always a good choice. Do we add Belmont? Davidson's star player is dicey, so it's doubtful they will continue as upstarts. Let's add Wyoming to the list if they are in the Big Dance.

Only 10 more days til Selection Sunday!

Pleasure, #7 (ranking member)

:app: :app: :app: I love it, Anne! There is nothing like an enthusiastic fan!!!

I remain true blue to my UNC Tar Heels!!!!!

After their last game it's hard to back my Jayhawks, but back them I will anyway. After losing all 5 starters last year I think Self has done a tremendous job with this young team!

U of W Huskies will always have my baketball heart. Especially when they win!

We love our GATORS!

IT'S GREAT to be a Florida Gator!!!!! Always has always will be ....

Sue, your Jayhawks played well yesterday. We're still in the Hartford Hunt and meet Pittsburgh tonight. GO BLUE DEMONS!

Cheers, Anne

Anne - I saw your score last night. Thrilled you are still playing. And how is Mustang Sally's? :)
Paris twins had a good Senior Day. Can't even think what it will be like next year without them. Will just continue to enjoy the rest of this year.
Good luck against Pitt.

Well .. shoulda woulda coulda vis a vis Pitt. We win the first one by 3; we lose the second one by 3. On to the NCAA big dance .. (she says with reasonable confidence)

Betty, I met a fellow Oklahoman who is consigned to life in Texas last weekend. It must be a different world! I'm delighted our Paris girls had a good Senior Day. Good luck in the tournament. Someday, hope you will teach me the hands-free wine drinking skill. It's useful for basketball tournament road trips!

Meanwhile, relaxing back at the ranch and readying myself for Big Beast, he-man style.

Best of luck to all of us on our favorite team's conference tournament outcomes. It's only 5 more days til Selection Sunday!!

Cheers, Anne

WOO HOO! And now for our fifteen seconds of fame ...

Demons, Fans and Keeping the Flame Alive

After four hours of amazing Big East basketball, we had a victory dinner nearby and saw a play, "Impressiunisms", in previews. It's pretty good .. yet would benefit with further script fixes. Joan Allen was marvelous, and it was oh so fun to see Marcia Mason, albeit briefly. We stayed at the Library Hotel - have been intrigued by it for years. A really great choice if you want a boutique hotel in a quiet section of midtown. I'd certainly stay here again.

Back to Mustang Sally's this morning ... ah, how sweet it is.

Cheers, Anne

LIVE FROM STAPLES CENTER LA...
The first game in the PAC 10 tourney just ended with a decent victory for Stanford. As this is my first tourney I am learning this is not just about basketball. Mark seems to be using his binoculars only to look at the cheerleaders.
We have great seats, 8 rows back of courtside. The downside is they are directly behind the Pep band and the row of tall tubas. As we liked this row Mark "relocated" us about 60 degrees to the right. If you look like you own it, it can be yours!
Cougars and Ducks are up next. Cal plays U$C tomorrow! Go Bears!!!

Suzanne .. the tubas and sousaphones count for 50 and 100 fans apiece.

Welcome to the PAC 10 and best of luck to your Bears!

Cheers, anne

Good golly, miss Molly! So many upsets in yesterday's tournament games. Choosing the top ranked seeds just got a lot harder for the NCAA selection team.

I don't like Syracuse .. but 6 overtimes and they upset UConn? What a comeback!!! It took a while to settle down to sleep after watching that marathon!

Who wants to set up the brackets this year?
Cheers, Anne

The Arizona Wildcats are mourning in Tucson.

Are we going to do a pool this year? I've been so busy I "almost" forgot about tournament time. Looked up from my computer the other day wondering if it had already happened. Bad. Bad.

I'm glad I was at work and didn't see the debacle. You're right Anne Syracuse game was amazing!

Sorry your Bears lost to my Trojans! Tonight the Trojans play the Bruins...gonna get real tough!
Sounds like you're having a great time though...

Anne - I missed what was going on with UConn, as I watched 3 of the top Big 12 teams go down in flames. The brackets should be very interesting this year.

Betty .. brackets are going to be MIGHTY interesting this year.


The group will be on Yahoo! sports again this year.

1. Click on the following link to enter the Yahoo! Sports brackets

Yahoo Sports Bracket sign-in

2. Click on "Join a Group" When asked which group, it's the following:

Group ID #67387

Name: LCT March Madness
Password: lct

3. It will, at some point, ask you to sign into Yahoo! If you don't already have a Yahoo! ID, you'll need to create one before you put your picks into the system.

4. When you create your new bracket in the LCT March Madness group, it asks whether you want to use an existing bracket or create a new one.

If this is the only group you are joining, choose 'create a new bracket.' You'll need to come up with a unique name. I've used 'adrennblue'. If it works like last year, you cannot change your bracket name once you've created it.

For those playing in multiple groups - there's an option to 'select an existing bracket' if you want to play the same picks in each group.

5. Selection Sunday is March 15 for the men's tournament. Play-in game is March 17. Tournament starts in earnest March 19. Not sure if you have to have picks in before the play-in game on March 17, or if the deadline is before play starts on March 19. I assume they will notify us.

6. They will probably have a second chance men's bracket following the first weekend. If we like, we can do that bracket, too.

7. If there's a women's bracket, I'll set that up, too. Their selection is on Monday, March 16. No play-in game, so you have to have entries in before their play starts on March 21.

Cheers, Anne

Anne - thanks for doing this.
OU women off to good start. Watching them this morning made me wish I had gone to "visit my family," with a slight detour to the Cox Center. :)
Poor prior planning on my part.

Thanks for setting up the bracket this year.

That was quite a game last night. CT & Syr are my two LEAST favorite teams, but I sure enjoyed watching that one. I actually found myself rooting for the Orange - I think that was a first.

As I do every year, will be pulling for the Temple Owls again this year. :D
I can hope, can't I? Maybe they can reincarnate Harry Litwack.

Thanks Anne. I was of course rooting for 'cuse but it wasn't to be tonight. Probably were too exhausted after the past two nights. Too bad I missed the xtra inning game the other night. Got to pick 'cuse to move up in the rounds.

Tonight's the night!

NCAA men\'s selection show

Bracketology for those of you who want to start boning up on your choices early

Bracketology

Three #1 seeds from the Big East? Two of whom did not win a game in the conference tournament? It's the ol' 'body of work' tournament genie at work. No where to go but the 'overrated!' catcalls from there. As per usual, Pac 10 gets little respect. My other complaint? If correct, Cornell is an automatic bid but in the playoff game. One of many reasons IMHO they should eliminate the play-in game altogether. Harrumph.

Arlene - Louisville had a strong win; but 'cuse was the story of the tournament. They are tough as nails with stamina to boot. Not only that, Gil's Owls are IN with their win over Duquesne.


Luke - where are our Belmont Bruins this year? Think they will get into the NIT? Like Heidi says on Project Runway .. one day you're in and the next day you're out. I will miss all the noise Belmont made in last year's tourney.


Women's bracket announced tomorrow - ESPN.

Betty, Beth and Suzanne .. the women's bracket is getting ever more interesting. I hope the Sooners, Tar Heels and Bears have shaken off their trouble. They must gear up against UConn!


Sneak peek (part of which can't be right - they've got 2 Big Ten teams playing in the same site for the first round)

Women\'s Bracketology

Let's PLAY BALL

Talk about Madness - the Badgers made it! Probably before many other deserving teams. And then they are playing Florida State, reminding me of when they blew us out of the water in our football bowl game a few months ago....ahh, let me remind myself that they are 2 (very different) sports. Well, all I can say is, may they show why they are worthy of the 64!

And go Marquette! No matter that they are sans their best player in Dominic James. :(

Was about to have a stroke with the selection show. Where was OU? Finally the last bracket! Some interesting match-ups. My head is spinning. Happy I have a few days to ponder my picks.

Why are both Arizona and Arizona State playing in Miami? The Arizona Utah game should be at one of the (few) western sites. Pac 10 got no respect with a 4, two 6s, 7, 10, and 12. :(

Maybe they need to go to a 128 team tournament and forget the regular season. :D

Bobby Knight had half the same idea, Marc - 128 games AND the regular season!

Cheers, Anne

Anyone try to fill in their brackets? It doesn't seem to be working. I cannot make picks. Only thing it can do is put in the bracket with all higher seeded teams winning. If I try to edit those selections it is blank. I wonder if it's a Firefox related thing, or if the site is down?

EDITED AGAIN

gil

Upon further review, there is incontrovertible evidence the yahoo! site is messed up. :D ;)

The site's message board is loaded with irate bracket pickers who purportedly have contacted Yahoo! They report Yahoo! has acknowledged a problem and it is being repaired.

Let's give it a few more hours. If it's not fixed, we can set up the brackets on ESPN or another free site.

Cheers, Anne

It's working now.

But I had to pick the games before knowing who won!


I'd do much better if I could pick AFTER the game. <img border="0" alt="[naughty]" title="" src="graemlins/naughty.gif" />

I put my picks in but now Yahoo is saying I am not a member of the group! :mecry:

edited:

Now, it lets me in. Looking at the early scores, I think I wish it had deleted me. :D

Interesting mix of picks, everyone! Let the madness begin...

Editing to say that Greg joined in this year - he's that other Rudi on the board! :app:

I suspect there will be a few of us in the hoops pound before the weekend is out ..

PLAY BALL!

Cheers, Anne