On Thursday March 26th, the third round of the March Madness college basketball tournament, the Sweet 16, will begin, with four games scheduled. Of the eight teams that are scheduled to play that night, only two, Connecticut and Memphis, appear to be locks for the quarterfinals.
Connecticut, the top seed in the West Region, did nothing except crush their opponents in the first two rounds, winning both of their matches by a combined difference of eighty-two points. Purdue, on the other hand, struggled to victory in the first two rounds, even against twelfth seeded Northern Iowa. There is no reason to expect Connecticut to falter at this point in the tournament and they should beat Purdue handily.
Memphis, the second seed in the West Region, appears to have gotten it together. After stumbling through the first round, they defeated, convincingly, a respected but somewhat cocky Maryland Terrapins team by nineteen points. Memphis now draws three seeded Missouri, a team that blew a huge lead in their second round game before they limped to a win, partly because their opponent made a key gaffe down the stretch. Memphis, who made the finals last year, is considered by many to be an underrated team and the only worthy opponent to Connecticut in the West Region.
Over in the East Region, the top seeded Pittsburgh Panthers are not a safe pick and could lose for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, Pittsburgh is playing badly and has now drawn its first high calibre team of the tournament in Xavier, the region's fourth seed. Despite winning its first two games, Pittsburgh appeared to be 'coasting' by: they were in cruise control against fairly weak opposition and then 'turned it on' in the final minutes to pull away. Xavier is not the type of team you can just 'turn it on' against and they might punish Pittsburgh, should the Panthers not come ready to play (and they haven't so far this post-season).
Secondly, Pittsburgh will be under intense pressure as each player on that team will be playing in the biggest game of his life. No Pittsburgh team has ever advanced past the round of sixteen since 1974. True, the school has been this far before, even recently, but this is the first time Pittsburgh has appeared in the round of sixteen as a number one seed with the definite expectation that they should win. It could be argued that Pittsburgh will be playing in the school's biggest game in thirty-five years and that pressure, coupled with their poor play of late, could mean one thing: a choke.
Xavier, on the other hand, made the national quarterfinals just last year and will not be facing the same kind of pressure as Pittsburgh. The game should be close and Pittsburgh has the 'mental block'.
The other game in the East Region will be between the third seeded Villanova Wildcats and the second seeded Duke Blue Devils. This game is a perfect 'coin toss' as both teams are capable of beating the other. If you are making a pick here, just pick the team that gives a better payout, which should be Villanova due to their marginally lower seed.
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