By Tim Robertson
For at least the second straight year my mom owned me in the March Madness pool I run.
Given my mom is unlike any other and she watches almost every college basketball game in a season, still, how did she beat me? Given I might have jumped on the Tar Heel bandwagon after their ACC championship win and prophesied Texas A&M would make the Final Four. How can this happen? Had the Aggies beat Memphis and knocked off the Buckeyes, the bracket championship undoubtedly would belong to me, instead of my Gator-crazed mother. I had such a strong confidence in those Aggies that I went out and bought an A&M T-shirt from Steve and Berry’s. Ouch.
My downfall, like so many of the Hofstra folks in the pool, turned out to be the George Mason syndrome. As loyal CAA fans, we believed Old Dominion and VCU would go far into the tourney. A few people had ODU over Florida in the sweet 16, and I had VCU over Pittsburgh in the second round. Not my mother. She wasn’t bit by the mid-major bug. She predicted no one worse than a No. 7 seed would reach the third round.
Overanalyzing the bracket is never a good decision. I knew that no team had repeated as national champion since Grant Hill’s days at Duke. Mom didn’t care. Her Florida-as-champs prediction stems not just from her obsessive watching of basketball, however, she also has a crush on Florida coach Billy Donovan. So does she really deserve credit if they win?
She hopped on the Runnin’ Rebels train, but guessed it right by writing that they would bow out against Oregon. Mom correctly predicted every sweet 16 game, and had three of four teams in the Final Four. Her only blemish was placing Rock Chalk Jayhawk in the semifinals.
My mom didn’t try to be different. She went for the banal choice of Florida versus Ohio State in the final. Again, I put faith in Roy Williams, and thought North Carolina would win its second championship in three years. Thanks Georgetown… you cost me big bragging rights. I won’t here the end of it. But I guess, neither will my friends.
How many people heard the Kevin Durant obsession and picked them to go at least a round further than they did? How many of you now think, well, maybe he should stick around for another year, put on weight and learn how to pass the ball before he joins a terrible NBA team? Yeah, me too. The Longhorns, a basketball power, not powerhouse, should not drop a second rounder to USC, a team that won’t be a basketball power until next year when O.J. Mayo comes to play.
In the later rounds, two teams really doomed my bracket. Georgetown, and their late comeback from 10 points down, and Memphis, who I still contend is not that good of a team. I should just face the facts and move on, but how did 1.1 seconds come off the clock, honestly?
Evidently, Mom trusted Memphis and had Hoya Paranoia. In fact, not only is one of my mom’s brackets going to beat me, no matter what happens Monday, but potentially all four that she entered will. Maybe next year I’ll put a limit on the maximum number of brackets allowed, to limit and maybe prevent such embarrassment.
Losing to Mom really isn’t as bad as I portray it to be. I can live with myself knowing she outsmarted me, again. But could I live with her? I’m heading north for Easter, and what do you think she’ll talk about at the dinner table? She will brag about how she is smartest and most knowledgeable blah blah blah. I have a solution for next year. I will ban my mother from participating.