The South Bracket: How I Picked 'Em and Why

#1 Memphis vs. #16 Texas-Arlington: Automatic.

#8 Mississippi St. vs. #9 Oregon: Mississipi State has one of the best defenses in the nation, but it's because they have the best shot-blocker in the nation, Jarvis Varnado. Oregon is not so big on the inside game anyway. Shouldn't be an issue.

#5 Michigan State vs. #12 Temple: This is going to be a slow, boring, low-scoring disaster of a game. I don't want to watch it, but I have to pick it. The best team Temple beat was Xavier, and MSU beat Texas AND hung with UCLA. So advantage Spartans.

#4 Pitt vs. #13 Oral Roberts: Can't root for a evangelical school.

#6 Marquette vs. #11 Kentucky: This is tough--Kentucky's been on a roll, but Marquette played a really hard schedule and didn't have a single bad loss all year, and beat Wisconsin, Notre Dame (twice) and Pitt. I like that about them.

#3 Stanford vs. #14 Cornell: You can't tell me the NCAA Tournament committee doesn't have a sense of humor when they pick Stanford to play Cornell...I mean come on. Stanford is really damn good, Cornell's going to get demolished.

#7 Miami vs. #10 St. Mary's: This is almost assuredly going to be a close game, and St. Mary's is bad at shooting free throws. Also, they have a true freshman point guard from Australia.