The NCAA March Madness tournament never fails to bring avid college basketball fans, casual followers, and even clueless non-fans together. Every year, people all over the world fill out their brackets in various ways in hopes to create the glorious "Perfect Bracket." Analysts follow every game of every team, and yet, year after year, brackets fail to survive even the first round. Last year, I remember my bracket being busted in the first round.
However, this all makes sense. Mathematical geniuses argue the true odds of creating the illustrious Perfect Bracket, but the odds range between 1 and 9.2 quintillion to 1 and 128 billion. Basically, it's impossible. It's so unlikely that billionaires like Warren Buffett have fun toying with the average people. Every year, the third richest man in the world offers a million dollars per year for life to anyone who fills out the Perfect Bracket.
There is a slew of different strategies for filling out a bracket. Die-hard fans will pour themselves into hours of research on every team and match up. Casual fans may pick their teams based on whichever teams have had a better history, or they've seen play. People who don't have any interest in sports or college basketball engage in a wide variety of different picking methods ranging from jersey colors, mascots, and coin flips. The beauty of the tournament, however, is that all of the methods are due to fail.
So as a fun game, I'm going to issue a challenge to all my readers. Below is a link to my own bracket challenge on ESPN. The password is "odyssey." Fill out a bracket, and enter tournament challenge. I will send $5 to the winner of the group at a small amount of suspense. You'd also be eligible for the million dollar per year challenge (however, your chances are next to none...) If you have any questions or would like to donate to the pot, email me at Derek_Page1@Baylor.edu.
http://games.espn.com/tournament-challenge-bracket...
Password is "odyssey"
Good luck everyone! May your March stay mad and your Bracket be unbusted!
#RushBUAthletics
