March has not been the best month for me. Halfway through our vacation in Cartagena at the beginning of the month I got really sick. I was laid out for a day and then could only go out for a few hours at a time before I needed a rest. It was really frustrating but on the positive side it did force me to have a relaxing vacation, which is not something that I am exactly known for.
It took about two weeks for me to start feeling better and then I got hit with a terrible cold that I am just now starting to get over. Feeling under the weather for the past three weeks has been really frustrating because going to work has taken everything out of me so all of my energy is gone by the time I get home. As a result I have done very little outside of work with one notable exception; Frank and I went to the first two Michigan games in the NCAA Tournament last weekend.
Let me back up a bit and say that I love the NCAA Tournament. I went to Duke for undergrad and it is just about impossible to graduate without becoming a fan of college basketball. To me college basketball is so much more fun to watch than professional and nothing is better than the NCAA Tournament. Every year there is so much excitement: great match-ups, Cinderella stories, upsets and players leaving everything they have on the court.
After the bracket comes out on selection Sunday I always fill out my bracket in the same method every year. First, I fill in Duke to win all of their match-ups culminating in the National Championship. I have never filled out a bracket without having Duke win it all, no matter how their season is going. It just seems like it would be traitorous so I go with my heart.
Once I put Duke all the way through I go back and fill in the rest of my bracket, making sure to pick at least one 5-12 upset. This year I picked two, Oregon (because I think they were totally underrated as a 12 seed) and UC Berkeley (because I went there for grad school so I am a little biased). Overall, my bracket so far is not doing so hot as I overestimated Indiana and New Mexico. The best I can do in the pool I am in at this point is fourth if Duke wins it all, Michigan makes it to the Final Four and Ohio State loses tonight. Here's where my bracket stands after the Elite Eight.
This year Duke was playing their first two games in Philadelphia, but Michigan was playing only an hour away from Ann Arbor. Frank has loved Michigan basketball since he was a little kid and I've adopted them as my second favorite team (after Duke!) so it was a no brainer for us to go to the games.
The first game on Thursday night was against South Dakota State and although Michigan won, they weren't playing their best basketball so we were a little worried about the next game on Saturday against VCU. Michigan played one of their best games of the year on Saturday and ended up blowing out VCU to advance to the Sweet Sixteen. It was really fun to be at the game, especially since this was Michigan's first Sweet Sixteen berth since 1994.
Meanwhile, Duke played on Friday and Sunday, handily beating Albany and Creighton to also advance to the Sweet Sixteen. We have casual Friday at work so I dug up one of my old Duke basketball shirts from my undergrad days to wear for good luck and it seemed to have worked.
In the next round, Michigan was in Arlington but Duke was only a five hour drive away in Indianapolis. We had Friday off from work so we debated going to see Duke play, but still feeling ill I wasn't up to the drive so we just stayed home this weekend and watched the games on TV.
On Friday night Michigan played Kansas first and it was quite a game. Kansas was pretty dominant for most of the game. With 2:19 left in the game Michigan was down by 10 points and a loss looked certain. Michigan went on a tear at this point and Trey Burke hit a three pointer to tie up the game with only a few seconds left on the clock which drove the game into overtime. Michigan dominated overtime and pulled out a win to make it to the Elite Eight. It was a heart pounding game and so much fun to watch.
Duke then played Michigan State with the game being pretty even throughout the first half. At the beginning of the second half Duke pulled away and never let up, winning the game by ten. It was not the most exciting game, but after nearly having a heart attack watching the Michigan game I was glad to just sit back and enjoy my Blue Devils win.
I'm so happy that both my teams made it to the Elite Eight. Here's hoping that they both move on to the Final Four with wins tomorrow (and that I am feeling better soon)!