The first round of the 2017 NCAA men's college basketball championship tournament began on Thursday, and with the exception of a few games, it just wasn't that exciting.
Out of the 16 games, only two of the lower seeds won their games, so anyone who played their bracket by strictly picking the higher seeds would have went 14-2. The only "upsets" were 11th-seeded Xavier being 6th-seeded Maryland in the West region and 12th-seeded Middle Tennessee State beating 5th-seeded Minnesota in the South region. Considering that Middle Tennessee State entered the tournament last year as a 15 seed and pulled off the huge upset of 2nd-seeded Michigan State, their first round win this year as a lower seed shouldn't come as much of a surprise.
14th-seeded Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) fell short in their bid to upset Florida State, as the Seminoles held on for an 86-80 victory. As if that wasn't disappointing enough, FGCU, known as "Dunk City", provided one of the lowlights of the first day with this missed dunk by Brandon Goodwin that was painful to watch:
Thursday's Northwestern-Vanderbilt matchup did provide a moment of true March Madness as Vanderbilt guard Matthew Fisher-Davis made the inexplicable decision to intentionally foul Northwestern with 14.6 seconds left and his team up by a point:
Northwestern hit the foul shots and won the game 68-66. It's going to take a long time for Fisher-Davis to come to terms with that mistake.
As far as top seeds, Villanova, who has 8/1 odds to repeat as champion, beat Mt. St. Mary by 20 points to start this year's run. The top two seeds in the West region, Gonzaga and Arizona, each won their game handily.
Friday's action has the potential to be more exciting as it features more of the heavy tournament favorites, including Kansas, UNC, Kentucky, Oregon, UCLA, Duke and Louisville.
Out of the 16 games, only two of the lower seeds won their games, so anyone who played their bracket by strictly picking the higher seeds would have went 14-2. The only "upsets" were 11th-seeded Xavier being 6th-seeded Maryland in the West region and 12th-seeded Middle Tennessee State beating 5th-seeded Minnesota in the South region. Considering that Middle Tennessee State entered the tournament last year as a 15 seed and pulled off the huge upset of 2nd-seeded Michigan State, their first round win this year as a lower seed shouldn't come as much of a surprise.
14th-seeded Florida Gulf Coast University (FGCU) fell short in their bid to upset Florida State, as the Seminoles held on for an 86-80 victory. As if that wasn't disappointing enough, FGCU, known as "Dunk City", provided one of the lowlights of the first day with this missed dunk by Brandon Goodwin that was painful to watch:
So close. #MarchMadness pic.twitter.com/UCSA7Xrj4K
— NCAA March Madness (@marchmadness) March 17, 2017
Thursday's Northwestern-Vanderbilt matchup did provide a moment of true March Madness as Vanderbilt guard Matthew Fisher-Davis made the inexplicable decision to intentionally foul Northwestern with 14.6 seconds left and his team up by a point:
A mistake by Vandy gives Northwestern a 1-point lead with 1.1 seconds left. #MarchMadness pic.twitter.com/wXaU52lFWZ
— NCAA March Madness (@marchmadness) March 16, 2017
Northwestern hit the foul shots and won the game 68-66. It's going to take a long time for Fisher-Davis to come to terms with that mistake.
As far as top seeds, Villanova, who has 8/1 odds to repeat as champion, beat Mt. St. Mary by 20 points to start this year's run. The top two seeds in the West region, Gonzaga and Arizona, each won their game handily.
Friday's action has the potential to be more exciting as it features more of the heavy tournament favorites, including Kansas, UNC, Kentucky, Oregon, UCLA, Duke and Louisville.
Moonlighting as a blogger to pursue my interest and enjoyment of sports. Former high school and Division I athlete (now a "retired" family man) that loves watching and discussing all sports. Follow me on Twitter (@HoldoutSports) and like Holdout Sports on Facebook.
