WINNER: 2016-17 NCAA basketball (ViperOverLord)

[flexmaster33]

Oops...tonight, tonight...really

[flexmaster33]

Okay, we are down to one title game left, so let's announce the Selection Show for 9 a.m. (PST) on Saturday ... the championship bracket and NIT brackets will be revealed and first-round games sent out. Good luck, all

[agentcom]

Okay, we are down to one title game left, so let's announce the Selection Show for 9 a.m. (PST) on Saturday ... the championship bracket and NIT brackets will be revealed and first-round games sent out. Good luck, all

Exciting! Looks like #1 UNR is going down to your Portland State in the conference championship Going to be interesting to see the effects of that loss

[agentcom]

Oops...tonight, tonight...really

Oh really?

[flexmaster33]

Sorry all...a busier than expected work weekend, I should have the brackets posted tonight.

[flexmaster33]

Please be timely in joining these playoff maps or risk being replaced in the bracket. Good luck all, let's have a fantastic finish.

[Witt13]

Excited to see how March Madness plays out! Best of luck to everyone!

I was wondering, who ended up being the #1 overall seed?

[flexmaster33]

Incarnate Word got the #1 overall seed

[Robespierre__]

Good luck to all! Another fine job by Flex.

[iAmCaffeine]

Extremely disappointing performance for me on this occasion. The worst I've ever done by quite a distance.

[flexmaster33]

Nice Crash Bandicoot

[iAmCaffeine]

It's an old school favourite.

[flexmaster33]

Only got partway through the tourney update before heading to work this afternoon...I'll finish it off tonight with all of the active scores and new matchups where available.

[flexmaster33]

All right, we've got six of our Elite 8 teams decided...getting down to the season's biggest games. Good luck, all

[flexmaster33]

Tennessee and surprise team Stanford have punched their tickets into the Final Four.

[agentcom]

I think the West #3 seed was Iowa State but now it's listed as Villanova which was also in the NIT. I don't think it matters but thought I'd bring it to your attention in case you have an error in your sheets.

[flexmaster33]

Iowa State no-showed in the NCAA tournament (first time I've seen that in years running this tourney), so as a solution, I took Villanova (the last team out) to fill that spot.

[CaronylKluster]

Flex - thanks for putting on this tourney. It's one of my favorites every year! So close to the Final Four this year.

Good luck Witt - it was quite a battle even if the score doesn't quite reflect that. Some bad luck in my more important scoring games.

[flexmaster33]

Thanks guys...glad people enjoy this one so much. My favorite to put on.

[Witt13]

Yes, thank you for running once again another superb tournament. Pretty much all of my games are either your tournament games or clan games typically.

And CK, it was indeed another great battle even though the dice significantly influenced a few games. It's a shame we always seem to meet each other before the end of the tournament, but we always bring out the best in each other.

[ViperOverLord]

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[center]Vol’s BIG VOLS!!![/center]

[center]Following a five-year hiatus Coach VOL is a champion again![/center]

For the second time in his eight-year coaching tenure and the first time in his five-year Tennessee tenure, Coach VOL is a champion after leading his Vols to an 83-66 victory over the vaunted Incarnate Word.

The top-seeded ICU Cardinals had a target on their back for the entire tournament. And in the final game, a team finally hit it.

Coach Vol remarked, “Back in my rookie coaching campaign, I had a top-seeded team just like that, maybe with exact same record even, that was unceremoniously put down way before a final, even. So, I know how tenuous a great record is when it gets to tournament time.”

Incarnate Word entered the game with a 28-7 record. A 29th victory was their magic number. In Coach VOL’s 2010-11 championship run, his Butler Bulldogs finished with a nice, round 30-10 record.

This final victory stretched Tennessee’s record to 23-12—it was no illustrious thirty. Still, there is something about the number twenty-three and legacies.

A Gray Horse

Some want to call these 18-12 Tennessee Vols a Cinderella story. This team that could not secure a first round bye more resembled a bubble team than a favorite. But how can a coach that had previously won this tournament and made last year’s Final Four with this team be called a Cinderella?

“Okay, maybe we were like a very light dark horse,” Coach VOL joked.

Some question whether the competition slept on these Vols. Coach Vol asserts that flying in under the radar was a miniscule advantage if that.

The coach is almost duplicitous on the matter, though. “It really felt like there was never any pressure. I’ve had great seasons and great players and felt a ton of pressure to win and then lost. This time around, we never felt an ounce of it.”

In 2013-14, Tennessee had two star players, a sharp-shooter, and a great sixth man. The second seeded team was bounced by Wisconsin in the opening round, 80-76. It was possibly the most tragic game in Coach Vol’s history. Given that result among other factors, one can understand the sort of crap shoot that Coach Vol perceives.

Middle Tennessee

Not to confused with another college by the same name, Tennessee finished in the middle of the standings for the second straight year. Last season, they were 17-11, 9-9 in conference play. This season they upticked to 18-11, 10-8. That is if you can call losing the final three conference games and being bounced in the opening round of the conference tournament again an uptick.

One can hardly talk about upticks when the downturn was noticeable. Coach VOL had led teams to regular season conference championships in five of the previous six seasons. And two opening round conference tournament losses in a row were a far cry from the days that he had won the conference tournament in each of his first three seasons.

Coach VOL lessens the significance of these last two regular seasons. “I knew I was due (for worse results),” he excuses. “Nobody’s gonna be on top forever, even if it sometimes seems like that. The competition’s just too stiff.”

Star Fall

Perhaps the most intriguing point of interest in this championship run by the Vols is that their star shooting guard Danny Bird was outscored in each of the final four games. He averaged 6.8 ppg while his counterparts averaged 14.5 ppg.

“Yea, Deebs could’ve saved me from some ulcers down the road,” Coach VOL teased his player.

Avoiding The Same Old Buzzsaw

Coach VOL’s Vols had failed to reach a final in the previous five tournaments. In three of them, they lost to the eventual champion. In each of the previous two tournaments, they lost to the eventual champion North Carolina Tar Heels.

Last season (2015-16) was especially egregious for the Vols, who lost to the Tar Heels four times—twice in the regular season and then in the conference tournament and later in The Final Four.
The Tar Heels would win their final game to win back-to-back titles. The previous season, they had beat the Vols in the Elite Eight.

The Tar Heels swept the 2016-2017 season series in two games to run their three-year carnage streak to seven games.

Coach VOL contends that his team was not psychologically impaired and that they were even eager to avenge those losses. But when the back-to-back champs lost their opening round game at the buzzer to Oregon State, 70-71, that traditional buzzsaw was turned off.

“We took note of it,” Coach VOL says. “But honestly, we had so much ahead of us that we really couldn’t take any stock in it.”

The Animal Rebounds

Only one team was going to finish the tournament with an unblemished 5-0 record. Yes, there could only be one. But few if any figured it would be these Tennessee Vols. Sure, they had won seven in a row following an opening regular season game drubbing at San Diego State, 69-46. That had been enough to even take the spot RPI chart. But this was all ancient history for a team that had lost six of their final eight match-ups prior to the tournament.

“We were a wounded animal,” Coach Vol concedes.

Wounded or not, a dangerous predator has to be finished off. And come tournament time, no proverbial beast or foul was up to the task.
Tennessee sank its fangs into Iowa to win their opening tournament match-up, 79-57.

Tough Tigers – Sweet Times

The rejuvenated Vols faced-off against heralded Princeton Tigers. Many had picked the orange and black to win it all.

“Coach Robespierre may be the best coach in this to have not won it if not just the best outright,” Coach Vol assessed. “Even if you’re on top of your game, you’re lucky if you post a W against that team.”

The Vols seemed to have been on top of their game as they won 73-67 in Coach VOL’s long overdue, first ever tournament match-up against Coach Robespierre.

Conciliatory Handshake Rehearsal

The Elite Eight game against Michigan was all tied with sixty-five faithful seconds on the clock. In the end, the Vols would come out on top, 71-69.

“I was just amazed we survived,” Coach Vol told a group of reporters. “Minutes earlier, I had been rehearsing the conciliatory handshake in my head.”

Coach Vol may be making light of a tight game. But in truth, it was that freewheeling outlook that may have properly infected his team. They were never pressing. They continued to just get quality shots against a strong Wolverines team.

“I think they got a bit anxious,” Coach Vol said of the competition. “I can’t say that surely mattered. But my team did seem like they stuck to the game plan more strictly.”

Strictly is a peculiar choice of words for a coach who had likened his situation to playing with house-money. But if the coach wasn’t feeling the pressure, he still put a premium on composure; and that seemed to pay a Final Four dividend.

Winning The Season Series – Advancing To The Final

The Vols were pitted against Maryland in The Final Four. They had swept them in their two-game conference season series but were eliminated by the Terps in a 62-74 loss in their opening conference tournament game.

That loss may have been the caution light that these Vols needed. Overlooking a team, any team, let alone one that has made it to The Final Four, is a grave mistake.

The Vols retained their edge, beating Maryland, 75-61. The game was much closer than the final score would indicate. Later, in the runup to the championship game, Coach Vol errantly stated how his team had only beat them by a few points. It was an understandable mistake for a game that was never in the bag until the final couple minutes.

Coach VOL’s Second Final

Six years earlier, Coach Vol’s Butler Bulldogs had faced off in a final against Coach Annexator’s Purdue Boilermakers in one of the greatest heavyweight match-ups ever. In the end, Coach VOL squeaked out the most meaningful nailbiter in his coaching history.

The championship game against Incarnate Word would not resemble that great game in any respect, though. The Vols would jump out to a seemingly insurmountable lead in the game’s opening minutes. Tennessee then missed some shots, and Incarnate Word went on a small run to give themselves a fighting chance. But the Vols carried their big lead into the second half.

Coach Vol explained, “You still have to retain your focus. Teams sometimes don’t do that, and it often costs them.”

The Vols finished strong and beat a team who could have delivered death blow of their own on any other day. But this day seemed to be in the stars for a coach who had suffered plenty of his own bad breaks over the previous five seasons.

“Maybe, we stole this,” Coach Vol almost regrettably states. “But if Coach Witt continues to coach, he’ll be back.”

For now, Coach VOL is back! Sing it, Peyton!

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[flexmaster33]

Well done viper, and thanks for playing everyone

Check back in October for the 2017-18 NCAA hoops season.

[Mad777]

Congrats, medals awarded.

Note: Prizes to be issue this weekend