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not so big.

As you can probably gather from the impressive on-court surrender cobra, not even everyone’s favorite #BasketballSchool could save the Big Ten this March — and from top to bottom, that’s pretty pathetic.

The news isn’t as bad for this year’s players in the Fourteenth Kind Of Annual Uncle Crappy NCAA Final Four Challenge (Brought To You By Piper’s Pub*) — in fact, this is one of the better performances in recent memory.

But. No. We’re not Blutarsky-free. We’ll get to that in a minute.

As you’re aware, now that we have a Final Four, we can begin awarding FKOAUCNFFC (BTYBPP*) points and taking a look at how we all stack up. There are, of course, more games to come and more points to be awarded, so these things — it’s not really accurate to call them “standings” — are my own weird mishmash of actual points and semi-wild conjecture. Do not fear — I’ll explain as we go.

Two and done — these players got one FF pick correct, but have no more points coming their way:

  • Ex-Pat Pittsburgh Girl
  • Aunt Annoyed Angel
  • Calipanthergrl
  • Spoon
  • Kewyson

Two and some — two points, more possible, but pick for champion is out:

  • Mrs. Crappy
  • Lianne

Two and Oooo — two points, champ is still alive:

  • Strang
  • Socialist Joe
  • Red Buppy
  • Dudders
  • Dish

Four but no more — two correct FF picks but no more points to come:

  • Styx 4 Curl Girl

Four and a few more — four points with the possibility of more, but champ is eliminated:

  • Uncle Crappy
  • Carla

Four and much more — two correct picks and champ still in play:

  • Mister G

Four and even more — two FF picks, title game and champ still in play:

  • North Coast Matt
  • Sports Chump
  • JCK158
  • Scooter

You’d think those guys in the last two lists were in pretty good shape, right? Wrong. Because we have one last category.

Six and sitting pretty — that’s three correct FF picks, title game participants and champ in play:

  • Miss C
  • Chachi

So here are the possibilities. If you’re not listed in the last three categories, thank you very much for playing. If Gonzaga beats Baylor in the title game, it’ll come down to the tiebreakers from Miss C and Chachi — and there’s only a three-point difference in those. There is also this outlier — no one has Baylor winning the whole thing … except for Scooter. If that’s what happens, no one can catch him.

And if someone other than Gonzaga or Baylor wins the whole thing? Ugh. My math-averse brain doesn’t even want to deal with that at the moment.

Wait. Did I say there was only one more category left? That’s not quite correct.

As I stated earlier, I was pretty pleased with the performance of our FKOAUCNFFC (BTYBPP*) participants this time around. But, as always, there are few who manage to distinguish themselves in a different way, by amassing exactly zero points when the scoring begins.

Or, rather, zero point zero points.

Ladies and gentlemen, your Blutarsky Award winners for the Fourteenth Kind Of Annual Uncle Crappy NCAA Final Four Challenge (Brought To You By Piper’s Pub*):

  • Cleveland Kelsey
  • Pgh Rugby Ref
  • MFulk
  • TraiLion

It’s a badge of honor, guys. Wear it proudly.

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it’s blutarsky time.

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I don’t think I’ve seen anything quite like the wreckage of Thirteenth Practically Annual Uncle Crappy NCAA Final Four Challenge (Brought To You By Piper’s Pub), in terms of how many people we’re going to honor with a Blutarsky Award here in just a sec.

Chalky picks only work if the higher seeds win, and the higher seeds failed to do that last weekend. Carolina. Duke. The Aforementioned Basketball School Up North. All dumped on their keisters before making the Final Four.

So who might win this thing? No one — not a single TPAUCNFFC (BTYBPP) contestants correctly picked the Final Four. But nevertheless, there are a few possibilities:

Four plus (Two correct Final Four picks and the possibility for more points):

  • Uncle Crappy (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA)

Two plus (One correct Final Four pick and the possibility for more points):

  • Socialist Joe
  • Dr. Scooter
  • Breaking Brews
  • Sports Chump
  • Ethel
  • Kelsey
  • The Other Scooter

Four and done (Two correct Final Four picks but no more points possible):

  • Curl Girl Michelle

Two and done (Two correct Final Four picks but no more points possible):

  • Lorenzo
  • HP

Before we move on, boys and girls, I would ask that you recall The Crappy Rule, as outlined in the contest’s initial post a couple weeks back. It says, in part:

If I were to come out on top of my own contest (and believe me, boys and girls, there is very little chance of that happening), the Piper’s gift card would be awarded to the next runner up (although I retain full bragging rights, which I would exercise almost daily until next year’s contest).

So pay attention if you still have points coming — you’re still in this thing.

And then … we have the people who most definitely are not still in this thing. You have managed to achieve the ultimate in college basketball futility … and for that, you deserve an award.

animalhousebelushi

A Blutarsky Award.

Why does a college basketball pool have an award named for a fictional character from Animal House? For this one line, which perfectly describes your TPAUCNFFC (BTYBPP) performance:

Blutarsky Award winners (No correct Final Four picks and no points):

  • Otimemore
  • Expatpghgirl
  • Aunt Annoyed Angel
  • Kewyson
  • Redbuppy
  • PghRugbyRef
  • Sara Without An H
  • Lunchbox Birdshit
  • Juan

Thank you for playing, Blutarsky people. And good luck to the rest of you.

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we don’t suck.

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At least, not yet.

Thanks in part to some pretty chalky entries — and I am as guilty of this as anyone, boys and girls — most of the contestants in Thirteenth Practically Annual Uncle Crappy NCAA Final Four Challenge (Brought To You By Piper’s Pub) are in pretty good shape going into Sweet Sixteen weekend.

But don’t worry, boys and girls — there is still plenty of time to screw this up.

I haven’t done any calculations, but I took a quick spin through the list, with the idea of providing a quick update. Here’s how it looks so far:

Final Four is intact:

  • Socialist Joe
  • Otimemore
  • Aunt Annoyed Angel
  • Kewyson
  • Breaking Brews
  • Lorenzo
  • Sports Chump
  • Curl Girl Michelle
  • PghRugbyRef
  • Scooter (not doctor)
  • Sara without an H
  • Uncle Crappy

Three left:

  • Lunchbox Birdshit
  • Dr. Scooter
  • Redbuppy
  • HP (who never actually told me who’s winning this whole thing)
  • Kelsey

Two left:

  • ExpatPghGirl
  • Ethel

One remaining:

  • Juan

The Sweet Sixteen games get underway shortly, kids. I hope this remarkable streak continues … but I doubt it will. And Blutarsky is lurking off in the distance.

 

 

 

 

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wreckage.

 I’m accustomed to writing posts about the smoking carnage that is the brackets of my AUCNFFC contestants at this point of the tournament. And the brackets of those entered in the Ninth Annual Uncle Crappy NCAA Final Four Challenge (Brought To You By Bocktown) are no different.

Well, actually, they are. If it wasn’t for the tournament’s overall No. 1 seed, Florida, advancing to the Final Four, I would be writing about what would likely be the worst set of initial AUCNFFC standings ever. And even with the Gators advancing, as so many of you predicted, our anticipated dancing partners failed to join them.

Because we now have a Final Four, we now have standings. And they’re not especially pretty. In fact, none of us — none of the 40 of us — managed to correctly pick more than two of the Final Four teams. There is a huge knot of people with two points and the possibility of gaining more — but because nearly all of those folks picked Florida, they have no hope of catching the few who picked the Gators and another of the Final Four teams correctly. We have a couple people whose picks could make things interesting — and yes, we have a healthy number Blutarskys (we’ll get to them in a little bit).

Your standings:

Four points (two correct Final Four picks):

  • Aunt Annoyed Angel
  • Sports Chump
  • Hellpellet
  • Jenny

These guys are in the driver’s seat. If Florida wins the tournament, it’ll come down to the tiebreakers these guys submitted when they entered. And no, there are no matching tiebreakers this year. And if Florida loses and UConn wins, these guys still have a lead that should be tough to overcome.

Two points (the outliers):

  • Barb
  • Bill

There are a ton of contestants that earned two points and have the possibility of more, but Barb and Bill are in a group of their own. Barb is the only one of us to pick Wisconsin to win the title and Bill was the only one to pick Kentucky. I haven’t done the math, but I’d guess that if either the Badgers or the Wildcats wins the title, there isn’t anything the rest of us could do to catch them.

Two points (with the possibility of more):

  • My mom
  • Casey
  • Terry Coyne
  • Bluzdude
  • Dish
  • Foodcollage
  • Tim
  • J.D.
  • Megan
  • Shane
  • Eric
  • Patrick
  • Scooter
  • Neilson
  • Otimemore

With the exception of Otimemore, you guys all have something in common — you all picked Florida to win, and the Gators were your only correct Final Four pick. But even if you’re right, you’re not going to catch AAA, Sports Chump, Hellpellet or Jenny. And while Otimemore picked Florida to advance to the title game (thus giving him the possibility for more points) he had them losing in the title game to Arizona.

Two (and done):

  • Crappydad
  • Dana Bee
  • Curl Girl Michelle
  • Father Spoon
  • Kristen
  • Tom
  • Doctor Lunchbox

Thanks for playing, guys. Hope to see you back here next year.

And that leaves us with the special members of the group, the ones who couldn’t muster a single correct pick in this year’s tournament. If you’re a new AUCNFFC player, you may not be familiar with the term “Blutarsky.” But it’s likely you do recall the scene in Animal House when members of the Delta house visit the office of Dean Wormer to discuss the mid-term grades of the fraternity’s members. And it’s probably likely that you remember what the dean says to John Belushi’s character — because the words, at this point, are immortal.

“MISTER Blutarsky…”

This year’s Blutarsky Award recipients:

  • Uncle Crappy
  • Mrs. Crappy
  • Gina
  • Chachi
  • Pghrugbyref
  • Trailion (and Evan)
  • RPM
  • Kewyson
  • Carla
  • Grandpa Caldwell
  • Juan

Thanks for your participation, my fellow Blutarskys. I have two suggestions: 1) Next year, go with the chalk, and 2) Be nice to this year’s winner — maybe they’ll invite you to dinner at Bocktown. That’s my plan, anyway.