faucnffc … go!

We have a record number of participants for the Fourth Annual Uncle Crappy NCAA Final Four Challenge, so we’d better get right to the picks. As per custom, we’ll start with Yours Truly:

Michigan State (requisite Big Ten team) against Memphis in one semi-final; Pitt (which will resolve its longstanding NCAA Tournament Psychological Issues) against North Carolina (which will overcome its the Significant Toe Injury [see Wells, Beanie, for an example] to point guard Ty Lawson). And Memphis beats North Carolina in the final. Why? Eh, it’s a hunch.

Wait. Mrs. Crappy isn’t picking her Tar Heels to win the whole damn thing? Somebody call the police — my wife has been kidnapped:

OK, my God U.C. can bitch when he wants you to do something – Do your brackets! Do your brackets! Do my blog! So here you go:

Louisville v. Wake
UNC v. Pitt
Final – Pitt v. Louisville with Louisville winning.
The closer Pitt gets, the more they choke!

Annoyed Angel claims she knows nothing of basketball, and yet her picks are solid:

Louisville v. UConn / Pitt v. Syracuse

Louisville beats Pitt in the final.

Kewyson’s notice of entry was even more interesting than usual. If you want to read the entire thing, you can see it here; the gist, however:

Final 4 (in mascot names / themes): St. Patrick’s Day inspired Sparty taking on a howling Jonathan, with the not so slender Jonathan taking the wining bite out of the Spartan / Roc the Panther ‘duking’ it up with Rameses, with Rameses butting heads and ending up heels above the little kitty. The final bout will entail an epic battle between a dog and a ram, with Mary’s little lamb prevailing in Detroit. (Mrs. Crappy will be sooo happy).

I did ask for confirmation, because I was stuck on the Jonathan reference; that, he said, is the name of UConn’s husky mascot.

My sister, who took a break from painting everything beige, is next:

Final 4 – Mich St vs Connecticut & Pittsburgh vs. North Carolina

Final Game – Connecticut vs North Carolina

Winner – Connecticut

Papuga remembered her friends in Pittsburgh and got in early:

WOO! I LOVE THIS TIME OF YEAR!!!

Okay…

Final 4: Memphis vs Louisville and Pittsburgh vs. North Carolina

Final game: Lousiville v Pittsburgh

Winner: Pittsburgh, of course (Come on, they’d revoke my pom poms if I went with Pitino’s team, even though I <3 Louisville too…)

HP takes her annual stab at college basketball greatness:

I really have a moral problem with cheering for Pitt and I am not interested in an Apple Tour. Here’s my 2009 wild ass guess.

Kansas vs. Memphis
and
Duke vs. Syracuse

Memphis vs Duke

Memphis Wins in Detroit

Last year’s champion, new father Father Spoon, thinks this is Pitt’s year:

Final 4 – Louisville, Connecticut, Pitt, North Carolina

Final Game – Connecticut, Pitt

Winner – Pitt

This is a long shot from hell with Pitt but what the heck, Papuga needs a grudge match.

Newcomer Jack, who joins us thanks to Dawn and his participation in the YinzTeam Turkey Bowl, not only makes his picks but taunts his girlfriend:

Final 4- Memphis, Louisville, Pitt, North Carolina

Final Game- Louisville, Pitt

Winner- Louisville

I know….same as Papuga’s only flipping her off with a different winner. I’ll pay for this privately.

I will reiterate what I said to Burgh Baby when she posted her comment: Michigan and Michigan State are very, VERY different — and I’m glad she’s going with Sparty instead of the Team Up North:

Michigan St, Memphis, Pitt, and North Carolina in the Final Four with Michigan and Memphis going to the Big Dance. Michigan takes all.

And, I’m sooo not afraid of Dawn and her pom poms (now that she’s not living in Pittsburgh).

Gina posted what is my favorite entry this year, because of her method. She first posted this:

I know next to nothing about basketball, so I let my dog pick (this was more complicated than I thought it would be and he took a REALLY long time):

WVU vs. Conn; Gonzaga vs. Pitt
Pitt vs. Conn
Pitt.

Naturally, I asked for further information:

I asked him and he told me. DUH!

Actually – I wrote the names on papers and for each match-up, I set them down with a piece of food and picked the one he went to 1st. I could have clearly spent than time actually learning something about basketball.

It was a slow work day…

I am totally rooting for Gina’s dog this year.

Next we have Mystery Michelle, who may or may not be a first-time commenter here at Uncle Crappy. We’re happy you’ve joined us:

Newbie alert! Newbie alert! I thought I would come out of ‘lurk mode’ and play:

Final 4 – Louisville, Connecticut, Duke, North Carolina

Final Game – Connecticut, North Carolina

Winner – North Carolina

We also heard from Large, who is the only one of us to actually play college basketball — not that that’s helped him much making his picks in the past three years:

Here it is…

Louisville vs. UConn and Pitt vs. Oklahoma

UConn beats Pitt

The juicy part is that UConn would be national champs with a 1-2 record against Pitt.

Michael says he’s not an expert, but he is from Indiana, where a certain amount of college basketball knowledge is just inherited:

No expert at all, but here’s what I came up with:

Final Four: Louisville vs. Purdue/Pittsburgh vs. North Carolina
Championship: Purdue vs. Pittsburgh
Champion: Pittsburgh.

Joining us from Harrisburg is my Polar Bear Plunge buddy Dahcheet:

Final Four: Louisville vs Memphis and Pitt vs UNC

Championship: Memphis vs Pitt

Champion: Pitt

Weeeeee are the chaaaampions, my frieeeends. And weeeeeeee’ll keep on fiiiiighting till the eeeeeend.

LET’S GO PITT!!!

Next up is Ethel, a loyal AUCNFFC participant from the very first year:

OK, here is my final four: Michigan State, Memphis, Pitt, UNC. Pitt vs. Memphis in the championship, Pitt wins it all.

And Fred, Ethel’s lovely and talented husband:

wake, memphis, pitt, unc

memphis v. pitt

pitt.

Nicole, Pittsburgh’s favorite rugby-playing lawyer, is also a Louisville born-and-bred college basketball nut. The interesting part here is that she went to school at Pitt. So what did she decide?

Louisville vs. Connecticut

Pitt vs. Arizona State

Louisville vs. Pitt

Louisville wins!

Wishful thinking, I know, but it could happen!

Note: Nicole and I have bet a cocktail on potential second-round Ohio State-Louisville game. I’m thirsty already.

Mr. Lokay, our favorite Pittsburgh television personality (since Joe DeNardo is retired), is a first-time player; he also may be a bit nostalgic for the time he spent in Syracuse, N.Y.:

Memphis
Syracuse
Villanova
Louisville

Memphis vs Syracuse

Memphis wins.

Long-time playa Carolina Boy may have earned a new nickname: “Chalk Boy.”

So keeping with tradition, Carolina Boy will go with all #1 seeds even though there was a fleeting thought of taking Duke to Detroit.

Louisville, UConn, Pittsburgh, UNC

UConn, UNC

Tarheels!

Carla may be going to school at Robert Morris, but her picks are going in another direction:

Louisville vs. Memphis / Villanova vs. UNC

Louisville vs. UNC

UNC.

Mr. Burns, winner of the first two AUCNFFCs, decided to stick with teams that are actually playing in the tournament this year:

I’ma goin’ wit’:

MW: Lew-uh-ville

W: Memphis

E: Pitt

S: Oklahoma

Semi: Memphis

Semi: Pitt

Final: Pitt, against my better judgment, to win it al.

That’s right, I said “al”. Pitt will win it “al.” Had I said Pitt was going to win it “all,” I would have jinxed them.

I’m sure Al’s going to be happy about this.

Next is Adam, a former colleague of both mine and Mrs. Crappy’s:

Here are my completely unoriginal-and most likely incorrect-selections. Please note: These are most definitely wrong. And FYI, in my two brackets, I have RMU winning on one, and Binghamton winning a game on the other. Hey, it could happen, right?

Final 4: Louis, Memphis, Nova, UNC
Finals: Memphis, UNC
Champ: Memphis.

And finally, we have Juan. I couldn’t find any references of Phil’s Mom making picks this season, so I hauled out a penny and started flipping, all the way through the brackets. The penny has spoken:

Utah v. Cal / Minnesota v. Radford

Minnesota beats Utah for the title.

Hey, it could happen.

As I’ve gone through the picks, I’ve noticed a couple of trends:

• Lots of taunting of Papuga. That’s always a good thing.
• LOTS of common picks. I think we need a tie-breaker here, boys and girls — if I could trouble you to send me a predicted score of your championship game, it would be a big help. I beleive Mr. Burns and Fred have already given me one.

And that’s it kids. I am exceptionally pleased with the level of participation this year — thanks to all of yinz for making it happen. Although I’m sure I’ll have a few informal updates between now and then, you should look for a standings post on Monday.

And as always: Good luck to everyone. Especially me.