Last night’s NCAA basketball predictions were much better as I forecast three of the four games correctly: victories by Florida, Arizona and slight underdog, Dayton over Stanford.
Saturday, Dayton, which lost in the 1967 NCAA final to Lew Alcindor and UCLA, will play top seed Florida. The Gators sent the 2014 UCLA team home with an 11 point win last night. The Florida Gators are the tournament favorite and overall top seed.
Under current coach Billy Donovan, Florida won back to back titles in 2006 and 2007 but were upset in last year’s regional final by Michigan.
Also last night, West region top seed, Arizona won by six points as an eight point favorite vs San Diego State. They will face Wisconsin in the regional final on Saturday. Wisconsin beat Baylor last night.
Predictions time: Florida, a ten point favorite to win by seven points vs Dayton. I forecast three point favorite, Arizona to win by five points win vs Wisconsin.
After the baseball season opened in Australia with two L.A. Dodgers’ wins vs Arizona, there are more “openers” this coming week.
On Sunday night, the Dodgers are involved again as they visit San Diego in the first Sunday night game.
The New York Yankees, who closed a rare non playoffs season last year, with three straight wins at Houston vs the Astros, open there this year. I wondered about that, but remembered the Astros are in the American League now, beginning their second season.
The other New York team, the Mets host the Washington Nationals in the opener for both teams on Monday, March 31st.
I recall the official opening day game being in Washington D.C. and it never being in March, but April.
Yesterday I revealed my predictions for the East and West region semi-final games. Today let’s “pick wrong,” regarding games in the South and Midwest regions.
On Thursday night in the South region, I will go with favored Florida to win vs UCLA by 7 points. Florida is a four and a half point favorite.
I predict their opponent in the regional final on Saturday will be upstart Dayton, which will pull a third straight upset, winning as a 3 point underdog vs Stanford.
On Friday night in the Midwest region, look for Louisville to win a very close game vs intrastate rival Kentucky.
The defending national champion, Louisville Cardinals will play Michigan in the regional finals.
If that happens and I predict it will as I think Michigan will win by 6 points vs Tennessee, the regional final on Sunday will be a rematch of last year’s tournament championship game.
Louisville won that contest and stay tuned here for our predictions, a day before, on the regional final games this Saturday and Sunday.
Thus far my NCAA Basketball Tournament predictions have been lacking. With that in mind, on to the East and West regional semi-finals to be played this coming Thursday and Friday night.
The NCAA basketball tournament returns to Madison Square Garden for the first time since 1961 with two East region games Friday and one on Sunday.
Close to, if not local team, Connecticut University will win as a slight underdog vs Iowa State University in Friday’s opening game. It will be a close game.
In the second game Friday night at Madison Square Garden, look for favored four seed, Michigan State University, to win vs the one seed, University of Virginia team.
On Thursday night in the West Region, Arizona University, a seven point favorite, is my pick by 4 points vs San Diego State University. In the other West region game, look for Baylor University to upset Wisconsin University.
The 2014 Major League baseball season began in Australia and the top rated Los Angeles Dodgers got off to a good start.
L.A. won both games vs the Arizona Diamondbacks and will play in the next game scheduled, this Sunday night, at San Diego, vs the Padres.
The Dodgers “perceived” wins total of 93 is the highest in the major leagues and they are only two and half to one to win the National League pennant. They are considered the favorites in the N.L. by a fairly wide margin.
Last year, after struggling early on, the Dodgers went on an amazing run around the All Star Game and eased to the N.L. West crown.
They beat the Atlanta Braves in the division series three games to one. The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Dodgers four games to two in the NLCS.
The University of Connecticut pulled a slight upset beating second seed Villanova in the round of 32 yesterday. Until last year both teams played in the Big East Conference.
Connecticut has won three NCAA titles while Villanova won their only title as a big underdog in 1985.
Also yesterday a pair of two time champion coaches, Billy Donovan and Rick Pitino guided their teams into the regional semi-finals next week.
In the day’s first game, Billy Donovan’s Florida Gators won fairly easily vs Pittsburgh University.
In the second game, defending NCAA basketball champion Louisville Cardinals, coached by Rick Pitino, won by 15 points vs St. Louis University.
Happy birthday today to the great broadcaster, Bob Costas. His work has been outstanding for so long that some people take him for granted. I do not.
Wonder if Bob will be watching Syracuse basketball on his birthday today?
Kudos to upstart Mercer University for its upset win vs Duke University in the round of 64 in the NCAA Tournament.
It was one of the big upsets in recent tournament history as the 14 seed Mercer beat the third seed, Duke.
However, I believe that Tennessee University another tournament upstart, in fact a team that had to play its way into the round of 64, will beat Mercer in tomorrow’s game.
It turns out the Las Vegas people agree as Tennessee is an 8 point favorite in the game. I predict Tennessee to win by 6 points.
The Syracuse basketball team is a seven point favorite for its game vs Dayton in the round of 32. The game will begin at 7:10 pm Eastern time on Saturday.
On paper Syracuse got a “present” as Dayton University upset Ohio State in the round of 64.
I do not think Syracuse will take Dayton lightly and will win by around 10 points. Dayton’s greatest season was in 1967, when they were runners-up to Lew Alcindor’s first UCLA title team.
I also predict Syracuse will get another break and not face Kansas in the regional finals. The Jayhawks of Kansas will lose before that round.
Eventually Syracuse will have to beat top seed Florida and do not rule that out.
There is no prohibitive favorite in this year’s NCAA Basketball Tournament.
The top choices; Florida, Arizona, Michigan State and Louisville are all at least five to one underdogs, to “cut down the nets” as champions in Dallas, Texas on Monday night April 7th.
As promised, some predictions: The final four will match Florida against Michigan State. The other game will be Arizona vs Duke.
The final will be Michigan State vs Arizona. I predict Arizona will win it all.
Andy B Sports 