March Madness is finally here! We’ve waited a whole year for this moment, enduring a fantastic season of college basketball that began back in November in the meantime. 68 teams all have hopes of claiming a national title, but by early April, only one will stand victorious.

Hopefully you’ve filled out your bracket by now, since the tournament has already begun. How did you fill out your bracket? Did you just pick the team you thought would win? Did you flip a coin for each game? Or did you do some other crazy ritual to predict your bracket? I have a patented method that seems to have the same result every time:

1. Research the bracket. Look into teams’ game logs, statistics, injury reports, etc. Know these teams.
2. Mess around with the bracket. Look at potential matchups, see who matches well against other teams. Make sure to take recent trends and history into account.
3. Finalize your picks. Make sure you’re confident with who you’re picking to win each game.
4. Sit back and watch the Madness.
5. …
6. Watch your predicted champion lose in the first round, and come in last place in your bracket pool while someone who’s never watched a game in their life wins the prize.

Happens every time.

So what does my bracket look like this year? Who are the contenders and who are the pretenders?

Here’s the link to my bracket: http://games.espn.com/tournament-challenge-bracket/2018/en/entry?entryID=2885665

So I have Virginia winning it all this year. Yes, original choice, I know. But I really like this team. I love how different they are from other top teams. They’re a fantastic defensive team, and that’s their main claim to fame. They don’t have the flashy offense that other contenders have and people adore. They’re different, and I love that about the Cavaliers. Of course I made my choice before De’Andre Hunter was injured. It will be interesting to see how the Cavs adjust and if they can still make a run to the title without him.

How about the Cinderellas? Everybody loves a good Cinderella team. When I first got into college basketball in 2011, VCU was the real Cinderella, going from a First Four game all the way to the Final Four before losing in the semifinal. It’s that kind of craziness that can happen all the time in March that makes this tournament something special. In my own bracket, I have three double digit seeds in the Sweet Sixteen: #11 Loyola Chicago, #11 St. Bonaventure, and #12 New Mexico State. As I type this, Loyola Chicago is tied with #6 Miami in their first round game, 28-28 at halftime, while St. Bonaventure and New Mexico State have yet to play. St. Bonaventure did win their First Four match against UCLA, but that result doesn’t matter in the scope of ESPN’s Tournament Challenge. It doesn’t matter to me either, since I picked St. Bonaventure to go to the Sweet 16 before that game was even played!

There’s just something magical about March Madness. It’s fantastic to sit down and watch 68 teams duke it out in a sudden-death bracket: loser going home and winner advancing every time. It’s especially entertaining when you have friends to compete with, as I happen to be in a few bracket pools this year.

Even if you’re not into college basketball, I HIGHLY recommend you buy into the hype. There’s just nothing like March Madness.