The college basketball season is winding down, which means March Madness is upon us.
The annual men’s and women’s National Collegiate Athletic Association tournaments are among the most closely watched sporting events in the U.S.
Make your own bracket online or print
What you can do:
Every year, millions of people fill out their own brackets in hopes of correctly guessing who will win each round. It’s a nationwide phenomenon that takes over offices, families and friend groups, with spectators and sports bettors competing to see who will have the most accurate bracket.
You can make your own bracket online at https://www.ncaa.com/march-madness-live/bcg.
You can also click here to print your own here:
What are “brackets”?
Big picture view:
The teams are selected, seeded and placed in a bracket by an NCAA committee made up of 12 members. The brackets are broken up into four regions: Midwest, East, South and West.
The goal of the committee is to create a bracket that’s equally competitive in each region.
Thirty-one of the 68 teams automatically qualify to play in the NCAA Tournament because they won their respective conference tournaments. The remaining 37 teams are chosen by that 12-person committee.
Next, the committee will seed all of the teams. It determines seeding by wins, losses, strength of schedule and other metrics.
The teams are seeded 1-16 within each of the four regions. The top-seeded team will play the bottom-seeded team, and so on.
In 2011, when the tournament expanded from 64 to 68 teams, it also introduced the First Four round. That pits the four lowest-seeded automatic qualifiers and the four lowest-seeded at-large teams against each other. The winners enter the traditional bracket.
The teams are seeded 1-16 within each of the four regions. The top-seeded team will play the bottom-seeded team, and so on.
In 2011, when the tournament expanded from 64 to 68 teams, it also introduced the First Four round. That pits the four lowest-seeded automatic qualifiers and the four lowest-seeded at-large teams against each other. The winners enter the traditional bracket.
UH in March Madness
Local perspective:
The University of Houston clinched the No. 1 seed for the Midwest region of the NCAA tournament. and will play against the No. 16 seed in the region, Southern Illinois University – Edwardsville.
Round 1 for Houston happens Thursday, March 20, at Intrust Bank Arena in Wichita, Kansas. The winning team moves on to Round 2 on Saturday, March 22, at Intrust Arena.
This year marks UH men’s basketball’s seventh straight invitation to the NCAA Tournament, and their third consecutive year to be invited as a No. 1 seed.
The Source: The information in this article comes from the NCAA website and the Associated Press.
