The dream of a perfect bracket, at least on the men’s side of things, is just about over.
After starting the second round with six Yahoo Sports users still undefeated so far in the NCAA tournament, only five brackets were still left standing just two games into play on Saturday.
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All six users had Michigan rolling into the Sweet 16, something the Wolverines have now done in their past seven NCAA tournament appearances. Michigan, the top seed in the Midwest Region, beat Saint Louis 95-72 to start the day.
It was the second game, though, that knocked one user out. Michigan State fended off Louisville to grab a 77-69 win and reach the Sweet 16. The Cardinals were playing without star Mikel Brown Jr., who was dealing with a back injury. One of the six brackets that started the day had the Cardinals making it into the Sweet 16, something they’ve not done since 2015 when Rick Pitino was still their head coach.
All five of the remaining brackets have Duke, the top overall seed in the tournament, advancing past TCU in the third game of the day. If the Horned Frogs can play spoiler, we could be finished early.
Busted brackets filled first day
Less than 700 Yahoo Sports users even entered the second day of play still perfect after a slew of upsets on Thursday — including TCU’s win over Ohio State, High Point’s win over Wisconsin and VCU’s comeback win over North Carolina. They fell quickly into single digits on Friday, too. Kentucky’s wild overtime win against Santa Clara cut the number nearly in half to start the day. Then Utah State, Tennessee and UCLA all helped get that figure down to the six users that survived the opening round.
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By comparison, the women’s side of things was much, much slower. About 30% of users made it through the opening day of play on Friday, but that figure was finally sliced on Saturday afternoon after Virginia knocked off Georgia in what was the first upset win of the tournament. That brought the figure down to just 0.7%.
