It took just two games to dash the hopes of nearly everyone who filled out a March Madness bracket. After No. 14 seeds UAB and Georgia State turned yesterday into a real emotional roller coaster for college sports fans and gambling addicts, ESPNU tweeted that 99.3 percent of March Madness brackets had already been busted:
What it feels like when your bracket is better than 31 million other people
Molly Thomas and Mariela Rodriguez made some improbable picks and avoided the #BracketBusted curse, and we could not be more jealous.
11.57 million brackets entered in the ESPN Tournament Challenge. After 3 games, 86,737 are still perfect. (0.7%) #AlwaysNextYear
— ESPNU (@ESPNU) March 19, 2015 Before today’s games shake everything up again, we spoke to two novice bracketeers who accidentally made some of the best picks in the world.
Molly Thomas, a comedian living in New York, is currently ranked #931 on ESPN.com.
As of this morning, my bracket is ranked 951 out of 13,000,000 @espn I am better at sports than anyone you know.
— Molly Thomas (@mcthomas) March 20, 2015 That’s 931 out of 31 million people using ESPN for their brackets. Through seething jealousy and gritted teeth, we managed to ask her some questions about her bracket:
SB NATION: Are you a college basketball fan, or a sports fan in general? If not, why did you fill out a bracket?
Molly Thomas: I haven’t watched a game in years. I went to Indiana University and was into it when I was there. The team went to the finals my senior year (after the craziness of Bobby Knight being fired). That was all a big deal and that was exciting. That was the last time I payed attention. In general, I do not care about sports.
SB: How did you make your picks?
MT: I took four minutes to fill out my brackets. My boyfriend gave me two tips: That Kentucky was favored to win and that every year at least one 12-seed beats a five-seed. I just went on gut instinct.
SB: Are you currently winning your pool?
MT: Oh yeah, it’s me vs. my boyfriend and I’m trouncing him. More importantly, as of this morning, I’m beating 13 million other people on ESPN. I love it.
SB: Who do you have to win it all, and why?
MT: Kentucky, because (my boyfriend) Tom said so.
It might seem unfair that Thomas’ haphazard strategy garnered such impressive results, but she’s not the only one who had the good fortune of beginner’s luck.
Brooklyn’s Mariela Rodriguez came to our attention after we discovered this tweet from her proud-but-frustrated husband:
I made my wife fill out a bracket. So far she's in the 100th percentile. http://t.co/cmIzhZXvzA
— Brandon Gardner (@BrandonJGardner) March 19, 2015 Unfortunately, Rodriguez’s good fortune didn’t last, as the Purdue game dropped her out of the ranks of elite brackets. But we spoke to her about her brief brush with greatness:
SB Nation: How does it feel to know you're one of the most elite basketball minds in the country?
Mariela Rodriguez: I do have to say that I was very excited with my bracket putting me on the 99th percentile, but now I've dropped to the 80th percentile which is making me tear my hair out. Who knew I had such passion for the NCAA? Haha.
SB: 80th percentile is still better than most people. How long did it take you to set your picks?
MR: I really did not follow college basketball at all until coming to live in the U.S. (I'm originally Dominican and have been raised in England and Germany). I had no prior knowledge of what method to use or if any was even necessary in predicting a good bracket for the NCAA.
SB: What was your strategy for filling out your bracket?
MR: I was minding my own business watching Friends on Netflix until (my husband) Brandon suggested I should make my own bracket for the NCAA. This was on Tuesday. So if I had any interest at all, I had to scramble every bit of knowledge I had about basketball in general and choose my picks before the deadline on Thursday. After doing extensive research using what seemed to be trustworthy sources, I learned that there really isn't a way to perfectly predict everything and, when making a bracket, to expect some upsets. I created three different brackets and the big winner for me so far has been the bracket where I chose more lower ranking teams to win. I did choose a few favorites like Villanova and Kentucky though.
SB: If you did any amount of research, how ... HOW did you pick Georgia State?
MR: Georgia State was a wild card indeed. Even I knew that. But I wanted to follow the strategy of picking a few big upsets. I feel that as a March Madness newcomer, I can get away with a few wild card picks.
SB: You've got Duke winning the whole thing. Do you stand by that?
MR: I don't really know what made me pick Duke to win the championship in two out of my three brackets, but my husband's best friend went to Duke so I thought that was close enough to having some sort of allegiance to them. I also felt like I remembered that Duke was usually pretty good. I'm pretty happy with that pick so I'll be rooting Duke all the way!
SB: A day after you hit the 99th percentile, with more games finished, are you still winning your pool?
MR: I started off well. Too well. I got my hopes up! But reality has kicked in and my picks are now all over the place. I've dropped down to the 60th percentile with one bracket and jumped up to the 90th percentile with another. Now I'm yelling at the TV. I don't think I'd care so much if I hadn't tasted perfection this afternoon.
So, sports fans, here’s the takeaway: Make some unexpected picks. Don’t take it too seriously. And pick Kentucky or Duke to win it all.
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