The 2021 NCAA Tournament has concluded as the newest championship team in men’s college basketball was crowned at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis on Monday night, and many canine mascots, feline mascots and vet schools were represented.
Here at Dog O’Day, we enjoy supporting our fellow FanSided Network sites, which includes teaming up with each other on occasion.
So we grabbed a handful of other FanSiders from across the network to participate in the second Dog O’Day Barketology pool for bragging rights, with their primary site and role mentioned. (Many of us write for several sites within the network; for example, in addition to being co-expert here, I’m also a contributor at Bam Smack Pow and FoodSided.)
If a team advanced past their first round game and their predicted opponent didn’t, they we’re counting that as half a point, etc.
The 2021 NCAA Tournament Dog O’Day Barketology pool was a fun community contest.
So, with that out of the way, who else participated in our 2021 NCAA Tournament picks?
- Cristine Struble, expert at FoodSided
- Scott Brown, contributor at Bam Smack Pow
- Kayleigh Toney, expert at Fighting Gobbler
- Toby Jaffe, contributor at Daily Knicks
- Jonah Kubicek, contributor at Piston Powered
- Pirasanth Gunasekaram, contributor at Raptors Rapture
The canine schools playing were the Drake and Gonzaga Bulldogs and UConn Huskies, along with the Georgetown Hoyas and Loyola Chicago Ramblers (who use a Bulldog and Husky logo, respectively), they each got a bonus point (or its equivalent) for each win.
The feline schools playing were the BYU and Houston Cougars, Clemson, LSU, Missouri and Texas Southern Tigers; and Abilene Christian and Villanova Wildcats; they each got half a bonus point (or its equivalent) for each win.
The vet schools not otherwise mentioned were the Florida Gators, Illinois Fighting Illini, Michigan State Spartans, Ohio State Buckeyes, Oklahoma State Cowboys, Oregon State Beavers, Purdue Boilermakers and Virginia Tech Hokies, but they did not score any bonus points because math is hard and this was already complicated enough to figure out, haha.
In the first round, the teams advancing were Abilene Christian, Alabama, Arkansas, Baylor, Colorado, Creighton, Florida, Florida State, Gonazaga, Houston, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, LSU, Loyola Chicago, Maryland, Michigan, North Texas, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State, Oral Roberts, Oregon, Oregon State, Rutgers, Syracuse, Texas Tech, UCLA, USC, Villanova, West Virginia and Wisconsin.
That gave Kayleigh 28.5 points, Jonah 26 points, Cristine and Toby 25.5 points each, Ivan and Scott 25 points each, and Pirasanth 24.5 points after the first round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament. Wesley forgot to write down all of his picks.
In the second round, the winners were Alabama, Arkansas, Baylor, Creighton, Florida State, Gonzaga, Houston, Loyola Chicago, Michigan, Oral Roberts, Oregon, Oregon State, Syracuse, UCLA, USC and Villanova.
So in the second round Cristine added 5.75 points to her score (31.25), Ivan added 6.75 to his (31.75), Kayleigh added 8 points (36.5), Jonah picked up 7 points (33), Scott 5.5 (30.5), Toby 8.5 (34) and Pirasanth added 6.5 (31).
Advancing to the Elite Eight were Arkansas, Baylor, Gonzaga, Houston, Michigan, Oregon State, UCLA and USC.
That means the scoreboard now read Kayleigh 39.75 points, Toby 36.5, Ivan 35.25, Jonah 34.5, Pirasanth 34, Cristine 33.92, Scott 32.25.
The Final Four teams of the 2021 NCAA Tournament were Baylor, Gonzaga, Houston and UCLA, with Gonzaga falling to Baylor in the national championship game.
So the final score was Kayleigh 40.02 points, Toby 37.25, Ivan 36.25, Cristine 36.24, Jonah 35, Pirasanth 34.75 and Scott 34 points.
We used ESPN for this bracket challenge, and going by percentages Kayleigh won at 93.2 correct, followed by Cristine (78 percent), Wes (74.9), Scott (63 percent), Ivan (49.3 percent), Toby (26.6 percent), Jonah (23.1 percent) and Pirasanth (19.6); there were also two bots that placed fourth (71.7 percent) and last (zero percent). No one had Baylor winning, though nearly everyone had Gonzaga making the title game.
Congrats to all the teams, and please be sure to read these fellow FanSiders’ articles.