NCAA Tournament Bracket Challenge - Round 1, Day 2 Update

It was another relatively slow day to cap off the opening round of the 2025 NCAA Tournament, as just three upsets occurred on Friday.  The first occurred in the day's opening game, when (9) Baylor held on to defeat (8) Mississippi State in a close one.  (12) Colorado State and (10) New Mexico both went on late runs to knock off (5) Memphis and (7) Marquette, respectively.

We did have a few upset scares, however, as (15) Robert Morris stole a brief lead against (2) Alabama with under seven minutes to play and (10) Vanderbilt opened a double digit first half lead on (7) Saint Mary's before both favorites pulled through to come out on top.  Additionally, (11) North Carolina stormed back from a 22-point deficit against (6) Ole Miss, pulling within two points with just over a minute remaining before they ultimately ran out of steam.

The other high seeds more or less cruised to victory with little to no stress.  These include (1) Duke, (1) Florida, (2) Michigan State, (3) Iowa State, (3) Kentucky, (4) Maryland, (4) Arizona, (5) Oregon, (6) Illinois, and (8) UConn.  And with that, the Round of 32 is set.

There were a few bracket buster results in our bracket challenge, namely North Carolina's loss to Duke.  Our resident Tarheel fan had UNC going all the way to win the national championship, which obviously did not occur.  That makes two brackets of our 25 total to have their champions eliminated.  Memphis's upset loss to Colorado State eliminated a Final Four team from two brackets, and one bold Vanderbilt Final Four prediction was thwarted in painful fashion in a third bracket.

That leaves us with 20 brackets with all Final Four teams and their champion still in the mix, and we're set for some very interesting matchups in the second round with nearly all of the single digit seeds advancing.  You can see your ranking and your outlook in the leaderboard below as the Mega March Madness Matchup Monstrosity rolls into the second round Saturday.

We'll be back with another update tomorrow after the first half of the Round of 32 games are in the books.

​Written by Nick Swatson