March Madness is what some people call the most incredible time of the year. It’s where NCAA Division I basketball players face off. The tournament is single-elimination and creating brackets predicting how games are determined and who wins what has become a nationwide tradition.

“It is fun, competitive and makes the basketball games more fun to watch,” junior basketball player Colby Keller states. 

Others have family competitions, with friends, through the ESPN tournament challenge app, and many more ways to compete. Simpson men’s basketball manager Dom Lloyd said, “We would always have a huge contest in high school and give punishments to the losers.”

The odds of getting a perfect bracket are 1 in 9.2 quintillion. CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, Warren Buffett, gives a billion dollars to any fan that fills out a perfect bracket. However, no one has been able to fill out a perfect March Madness bracket to claim the billion dollars.  

Each year there are countless upsets. This year on the men’s side the most talked about is No. 16 seed Fairleigh Dickinson Knights defeating the number one seed Purdue Boilermakers 63-58. This is the second time a 16 seed has beaten a one seed since 2016. Purdue entered the game favored to win by 23 points; however, they could not pull off the win.

Junior Joey Goins predicted this upset, saying, “I was so excited, but I saw it coming from a mile away because of past events.”

The next upset that shocked most was No. 15 seed Princeton beating No. 2 seed Arizona 59-55. This is the third year in a row that a 15th seed has made the Sweet Sixteen. However, Princeton lost to Creighton in the Sweet Sixteen.  

“Creighton’s win over Princeton to send them to the Elite Eight for the first time in program history was exciting to watch,” Keller said. “Then fell to San Diego State in the national championship game against UConn.”

One game that hit home for most was the No. 11 seed Pittsburgh Panthers’ upset of the No. 6 seed Iowa State 59-41. Iowa State only scored 41 points, the second-lowest scoring in history. 

 “[I] felt as if Iowa State did not play their best and Pittsburg showed up to play,” Iowa State fan Joey Goins, said.

This Final Four has had the second highest total seeding in March Madness tournament history.

Moving to the women’s bracket, the national championship game consisted of No. 2 seed Iowa and No. 3 seed LSU. An upset did occur with LSU beating Iowa 102-85. 

“The refs were terrible,” Keller said.

There are some controversies about tournament MVP player from LSU, Angel Reese, mocking Caitlin Clark at the end of the game, but the game has already been called a massive milestone for women’s basketball with the amount of viewership it garnered.

The championship had a massive crowd of 357,542 fans, breaking the all-time attendance record.

Overall, the March Madness tournaments were record-breaking.