From Mike Lucas. For all of Lucas' work, check out http://mikelucassports.wordpress.com/
The first real day of the NCAA Tournament was as exciting as any I can remember. It had its blowouts, its nail biters, and its upsets. Here’s my reaction to day one.
Revenge of the Nerds: Only 5.6% of the 8-million plus brackets submitted on ESPN had #14 Harvard defeating #3 New Mexico. I wish I could say I was part of that 5.6%, but sadly, I had New Mexico in the Sweet Sixteen. 
I saw Harvard play earlier this year in person, and they didn’t look like a team that could pull off a major upset. In the game I saw, Harvard defeated Brown in double overtime in a game that the Crimson should have lost. New Mexico had just won the Mountain West Conference Tournament over the weekend, and was riding some serious momentum. I still don’t know how Harvard pulled off this upset, but I tip my hat to them.
I saw Harvard play earlier this year in person, and they didn’t look like a team that could pull off a major upset. In the game I saw, Harvard defeated Brown in double overtime in a game that the Crimson should have lost. New Mexico had just won the Mountain West Conference Tournament over the weekend, and was riding some serious momentum. I still don’t know how Harvard pulled off this upset, but I tip my hat to them.
C’mon Davidson: I had Davidson in my Sweet Sixteen. I thought Marquette was overrated as a three-seed, and would have serious trouble matching up with Davidson’s smaller big men. I looked like a genius for 38 minutes of the game. Davidson was up seven points with about two minutes to go, and blew it. Give credit to Marquette for making three strait threes after the starting the game 1-12 from deep, but, that was Davidson’s game to win and they blew it. I was not happy about this one.
VCU and Syracuse Dominate: When the bracket was released and I saw that Akron had to play VCU in the second round, I already knew that game was going to be a blow out. 
Akron is a good team, but their second best player and starting point guard Alex Abreu is out with an injury and without him, the Zips had no one to bring the ball up against VCU’s press. This one had blowout written all over it from the start. Syracuse on the other hand, was a very popular pick as a high seed to get upset in the second round. Who ever said that (not me), was sooooo wrong it’s funny. Syracuse dominated Montana from the get go, and in reality, the game was over when the score was 8-5 in favor of the Orangemen. Just to put this domination into perspective, Montana’s top performer of the game according to ESPN.com was Mike Weisner. His stat line looks like this: 3 points, 5 rebounds, 1 assist. Yeah, he played great. Syracuse dominated in every facet of the game.
Akron is a good team, but their second best player and starting point guard Alex Abreu is out with an injury and without him, the Zips had no one to bring the ball up against VCU’s press. This one had blowout written all over it from the start. Syracuse on the other hand, was a very popular pick as a high seed to get upset in the second round. Who ever said that (not me), was sooooo wrong it’s funny. Syracuse dominated Montana from the get go, and in reality, the game was over when the score was 8-5 in favor of the Orangemen. Just to put this domination into perspective, Montana’s top performer of the game according to ESPN.com was Mike Weisner. His stat line looks like this: 3 points, 5 rebounds, 1 assist. Yeah, he played great. Syracuse dominated in every facet of the game.
Pittsburg Stinks: I picked Pitt to beat Wichita St., and I really considered picking them to beat Gonzaga in the next round and thank god I didn’t. I saw Pitt play a few times this year and my impression of them was that they were a tough, good defensive team that can score enough on second chance points to beat decent teams. The reality of Pitt’s offense is that they couldn’t score 100 points in 40 minutes if it was a game of 5 on 1. Literally, that’s how bad Pitt’s offense was last night. It was the worst offensive display I’ve seen in a long time from a D1 team. Just pitiful.
Mountain West Who?: After having a bunch of teams in the top 25 all season long, people starting saying that the Mountain West Conference was the third best basketball conference in the country. If not third, people argued that it was better than some of the power six conferences, especially the Pac 12. After yesterday’s performance, those thoughts will be put to rest. Both of the MWC’s top two teams, New Mexico and UNLV, lost in the first round yesterday. Not only did they lose, but they were both upset by teams at least seven seeds lower than them. This is not a good way for people to start buying into these “big mid-major schools”. Both the New Mexico and the UNLV losses are devastating to the reputation of the Mountain West Conference. For the MWC to officially put their stamp on the college basketball relevance sheet, it needed these two teams to make deep runs. But they didn’t. Better luck next year MWC.
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