Just in case you are a living defiance of the opinions of some and immune to the solipsist fallacy (“I do not care, therefore NO one cares”) and are interested in having more than a common person’s interest in the quite probably exploitative and morally questionable national collegiate basketball tournament (perhaps you’d like a chance to beat the President like we ALL did last year) or maybe you’re looking forward to your handsome, frameworthy, certificate of victory (Sabino, I just remembered that I still owe you yours for your victory last year…and the socks–sorry!), but amn’t quite sure how to go about making your choices because you haven’t had any time to follow the college cagers this winter (owing to the spectacular weather), fret not. There’s help on the way.
First a clarification–the Realist’s post implied that the tournament had started already; not so! The play in rounds were last night, but those don’t really count. The first round games start at 11a on Thursday, so you have until then to fill out your bracket. Two steps are required. First, if you don’t already have one, you need to register for an account with cbssports.com–click on “Register” on the right side; it just requires an email address and you make your own password. Once you’ve done that, click here or do a search for “Harold Lounge” on the CBS site and enter “hl2012” as your password. Fill out your bracket and let the smack talking begin.
Who should you pick? Ah, an entirely different question. Here are some options for picking:
~Slate’s bracket help provides the chance to pick by colors and mascots only.
~The Wall Street Journal provides a blind picker with nothing but information about the team’s play this year, so you are not biased by reputation or other irrelevant factors, then when you’re done it shows you all of your picks.
~Slate also has some advice about how a hedge fund manager would pick.
~Or maybe you’d like to take a stand on principle and pick according to the schools’ academic stats using Inside Higher Ed’s analysis. It’s all good.
Make your picks and take your shot at the title and at joining the list of Champions!
2007 Champion: Jennifer Armendarez
2008 Champion: Jennifer Armendarez
2009 Champion: Someone
2010 Champion: Dave Richardson
2011 Champion: Chris Sabino
h/t to Realist for setting up the Bracket this year; thanks!