The Sandspur

Issue date: 3/25/05 Section: Sports

Media Credit: PATRICK SCHNEIDER/ KRT CAMPUS CHARGING TOWARDS THE FINAL FOUR: Center Sean May and his number one seed Tarheels advance to Sweet Sixteen.

As everyone with a pulse knows by now, the best sports event of the year, the Men's NCAA Tournament, started last week.

For those who haven't been watching, let me bring you up to date. All four of the tournaments number one seeds, North Carolina, Duke, Washington and Illinois, advanced with little difficulty.

Notwithstanding there were some major upsets as traditional powers Kansas and Syracuse both lost in the first round, ruining everyone's bracket. Kansas, a three seed, lost to 14th seed Bucknell which won it's first NCAA Tournament game ever before losing in the second round to Wisconsin.

Syracuse, a four seed, was upset by Vermont, the thirteenth seed. Vermont's Cinderella run ended like Bucknell's as they lost in the second round to Michigan State.

Besides the number one seeds, several teams have had strong showings so far. Louisville, who felt slighted by their four seed, has been playing lights out basketball and Utah, led by 7 footer Andrew Bogut have looked hard to stop.

There are still a few Cinderellas left in the tournament as twelfth seed University of Wisconsin-Millwaukee are still alive after upsetting Alabama and Boston College. Their run figures to end though as they face the number one team in the country Illinois.

The one thing that is certain is that their will be a new national champion as last year's champ Connecticut was knocked off by tenth seed North Carolina State and Julius Hodge. Everything else about the tournament is up for grabs.

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