By: JJ Lanier

TheSouthernSportsEdition.com news services

It feels like just about every year you could make the claim “this year’s opening weekend to March Madness was the craziest one yet”!

Obviously, this year was no different. Over the course of the tournament’s four day opening weekend, among all the upsets and buzzer beaters, I learned a few things as well as had some beliefs reinforced.

For instance, I learned the next time Syracuse makes the tournament as one of the “last four” teams in, I need to automatically pick them to make it to the Sweet 16.

For the 2nd time in 3 years the Orangemen won 3 games in 6 days, to make it the second weekend. Two years ago, they made it all way to the Final Four. They’ll have to go through Duke and possibly Kansas, if they want to make a return trip this year; it’ll be rough, but I’m not counting them out.

I also felt more secure in my theory that when it comes to tournament knockout pools, under no circumstances should you ever pick a team coached by Sean Miller or Rick Barnes.

While the final score against Buffalo was a surprise, Arizona actually losing to them wasn’t. As for Tennessee, I thought about picking them for their game against Loyola Chicago, until I remembered who was coaching. Barnes may have a done a great job with the Vols over the course of the season but winning in the tournament isn’t exactly his forte.

I realized this year that if an ACC team makes their conference tournament and enters the NCAA tournament as a 2-seed, playing in the closest venue to their campus, just go ahead and pick them to be upset.

It happened to Duke last year. They won the ACC tournament; were upset by USC in Greenville, as a 2-seed and it happened this year with UNC getting completely dominated by Texas A&M.

This next one hasn’t exactly taken place yet, but I feel so confident that it will, I’m going to go ahead and include it under the “beliefs I had reinforced” category.

After complaining about Kentucky’s seeding and draw, John Calipari will somehow try to convince people that his Wildcats made the most miraculous run to the Final Four ever and that the other teams had a much easier route, although his own team won’t have played a team seeded higher than 9th.

For the record, if Kentucky makes the Final Four, I’m not diminishing their accomplishment because of who they played to get there; just pointing out one of the many ways Calipari contradicts himself. Trust me, it’ll happen.

One thing I probably knew but was finally forced to come to terms with is as good of a coach as Tony Bennett is, the style of play his teams run isn’t conducive to being successful in the tournament; at least not consistently.

They’ve had some success in the tournament over the past 5 years (1 Sweet Sixteen and an Elite Eight appearance), but they’ve also been purses in the first weekend three time; twice as a 1-seed and once as a 2-seed. Plus, there’s the loss to UMBC, which doesn’t help their case.

Speaking of UMBC, the most important thing I learned over the first four days of the tournament was what UMBC actually stands for; University of Maryland, Baltimore County. I mean, it’s only fitting I try to learn everything I can about the team that made this “the craziest opening weekend in March Madness history”!