You Chose... Poorly

So far, 13 conference champions have been decided. One was Harvard in the Ivy -- a league with no conference tournament -- that had a two game lead with three games to play the day the pool was due (though that didn't stop Fitch, L Leach, S Leach, and M Paston from picking Yale), leaving 12 conferences with a champion we didn't know in advance.

Of those, the Big South didn't have a favorite among our entrants, although the team with the most votes (Coastal Carolina, with 27) did win the conference championship. Still, with only 27 out of 103 entrants picking Coastal, it's hard to say we did well as a group. Here's how our most popular picks fared in the other eleven conferences:

Atlantic Sun: Mercer (65) won the conference
Colonial: Delaware (67) won the conference
Summit: North Dakota State (84) won the conference
WCC: Gonzaga (85) won the conference
MVC: Wichita State (99) won the conference
MAAC: Iona (71) -- oops...
Patriot: Boston U (77) -- oops...
Southern: Davidson (84) -- oops...
OVC: Belmont (85) -- oops...
Northeast: Robert Morris (87) -- oops...
Horizon: Green Bay (89) -- oops...

That's right, so far our overwhelming favorite has won a grand total of 5 out of 11 conferences (45.4%)(not counting leagues in which we had no favorite or were decided before we cast our votes). The other six? Well, oops.

But there are a bunch more conference champions to be decided, so maybe we'll make a comeback, right? Right?

Not so much.

Another 14 conferences crown champions tomorrow. But even before the final's been played, we've lost:

Conference USA: Southern Mississippi (50) -- oops...
SWAC: Southern (47) -- ineligible -- AND Alabama State (44) -- oops...
Big West: Cal-Santa Barbara (60) -- a really big oops, as Cal-SB lost in its first conference tournament game to 7th seeded Cal-Poly by a score of 69-38...
America East: Vermont (78) -- oops...
Big 12: Kansas (88) -- oops...
Atlantic 10 (final on Sunday): St. Louis (75) -- oops...

The other nine conferences pit our favorite against (in most cases) underdogs so far under they've been classified as a different species:

AAC: Louisville (75) vs. Connecticut (0)
Big East: Creighton (62) vs. Providence (0)
Big Sky: Weber State (90) vs. North Dakota (2: Anania, Hammer)
MAC: Toledo (62) vs. Western Michigan (20)
MEAC: NCCU (80) vs. Morgan State (0)
Mountain West: San Diego State (59) vs. New Mexico (44) or Boise State (0) [late game]
PAC-12: Arizona (91) vs. UCLA (7: S Adams, Corey, J Donadio, Sr., Kovolski, M Leach, Lenok, Lenok 2)
Southland: Stephen F. Austin (97) vs. Sam Houston State (6: J Donadio, Sr., Isdaner, L Leach, Sanders, Steitz, B Wright)
WAC: New Mexico State (76) vs. Idaho (0)

The following face off in the conferences with no remaining favorite:

America East: Stony Brook (25) vs. Albany (0)
Big 12: Iowa State (8: Booth, Chumchucker, N Donadio, Gorenstein, M Leach, Quint, Steinhardt, R Wanger) vs. Baylor (1: Rybaltowski)
Big West: Cal Poly (0) vs. Long Beach State (4: Baumgarten, B Brenner, E Leach, Steinhardt) OR CS-Northridge (0) [late game]
Conference USA: Louisiana Tech (24) vs. Tulsa (0)
SWAC: Texas Southern (9: Blane, Crotty, J Donadio, Jr., M Josephs, E Leach, P Leach, Serri, Warner, J Whiteside) vs. Prairie View A&M (0)

More on who loses, tomorrow...