With the beginning of March coming and going, you may have heard the term “March Madness” floating around. If you’re not a huge basketball fan, you may have seen a poster for it, or filled out a tournament card blindly with schools you’ve never heard of. Still, none of these offer an explanation as to what March Madness really is. Luckily, we’ve got an article for that.
According to the National Collegiate Athletic Association, or NCAA, March Madness describes the NCAA Division I men’s basketball tournament that happens throughout the month of March. There are numerous events that happen throughout the tournament for both fans and athletes to participate in.
March Madness kicks off with Selection Sunday, which is happening on March 13. Selection Sunday refers to the day before the official tournament starts, when all 68 teams are ranked numerically from best to worst based on their season and team strength. After the tournament begins, four of the 68 teams are eliminated in a process known as the First Four games, leaving the tournament with 64 teams to compete.
After the teams have been narrowed down to 64, the remaining teams are then broken up into four regions each with 16 teams who are also ranked numerically. This differs slightly from Division II March Madness, where the teams are broken into eight different regions. Fans can start filling out challenge brackets betting on which teams will win out in the competitions against each other.
The event, while called “March Madness,” technically runs into the first few days of April. As the event goes on, teams compete against each other for the No. 1 seed placement until there are only four teams left.
These four teams compete in a tournament nicknamed the Final Four, taking place on April 2 and April 4 in New Orleans. Fans gather for these events to see how closely their betting brackets followed the actual results of March Madness and to cheer on the teams remaining.
The biggest part of March Madness is the betting brackets that fans participate in. Fans can participate in both official NCAA brackets and fan-made competitions. They can compete against friends, run tournaments and planning meetings in schools in universities, and compare cards with other sports fans. This is what makes March Madness truly unique, and why many refer to it as “madness,” because fans are scrambling to compare statistics and have their bracket be as accurate as possible.
There has never been a perfect bracket. Nobody has ever guessed all 64 games correctly. Could this year be the year? Only time will tell.
