2021 Survivor Pool Day 3 Recap

Historians will tell you that when Bobo wrote "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" he was talking about a day of violence in Northern Ireland. In reality, Bobo was talking about Sunday in the 2021 Survivor Pool...

We should have known we were in for a crazy day when Farva from Super Troopers turned into Michael Jordan and knocked off Illinois almost single-handedly. While this was a crazy upset it only knocked out one entrant, prodski6. Initially, these seemed kind of funny. Then everyone else got knocked out (almost).

Seriously, this was one of the craziest Survivor Pool days since we started running it. We entered the day with 224 Entries still alive, which was already low considering where we started, but we exit Day 3 with just 74 entries moving on to Day 4. Compare this to 2019....that year we had 251 live entries heading into Day 3 and only lost 42 of them. FORTY TWO. This year we lost 150 on Day 3.

This year on Day 3 there were 3 teams that attracted 70% of the picks:

Florida - 80 picks

Oklahoma State - 40 picks

Villanova - 38 picks

Of the 3 popular picks, only Jay Wright, the best coach in college basketball, got the job done. Florida blew lead after lead to be sent home, and Oklahoma State just never had a shot against the unstoppable Pac 12.

Without Rutgers complete collapse we would have even fewer entries still alive as 21 combatants advanced picking Houston yesterday. There wasn't a single pick on Rutgers. To the 5 people that picked Oral Roberts, congrats you beautiful psychos, that's the type of pick that wins this thing!

With Day 4 upon us, we are almost down to the final 10% of contestants. If you're still alive, good luck, it seems like you'll need it!

2021 Survivor Pool Day 2 Recap

Get excited, Day 2 is over, and the Day 2 Survivor Pool recap can now begin! First, links for the lazy:

Leaderboard

The second day of first round match-ups led to a pretty wide spread on selections. In all 21 of the 30 teams that played had at least someone picking them. 

Least Deserving Winners of the Day: Creighton was one of the most popular picks of the day garnering 23 picks despite having lost their last game by 25 and having their coach basically piss off their entire team. Down 1 late, Creighton got fouled, had a 50% FT shooter knock down 2 FTs, and then had UCSB miss a layup that would've won the game. To the 9 losers that picked UCSB, you made a great pick, that and a quarter will get you a cup of coffee, well, it won't. Coffee is like $12 now.

Most Loveable Losers: Kansas was a popular pick and their win moved on 30 contestants. But, the real story was that Kansas almost lost to the Groves Brothers of Easter Washington. If they had pulled this off we could've all enjoyed the movie about them starring Seth Rogen and the guy from Napolean Dynamite.

Chalkiest Pick of the Day: There were 3 people that picked Alabama and Nate Oates to knock off Rick Pitino and Iona. This was a pretty safe pick considering any Iona win will likely be vacated at a later date, but that would not have mattered for the Survivor Pool you all. Also, I find this amazing, in 2013 Rick Pitino was winning a National Championship at Louisville and Nate Oats was in his TWELFTH season as a head coach at Romulus High School, that season he was his first, and only, state championship as a High School coach. Now, Oats is coaching a 2 seed and Pitino is coaching a 15. that's a pretty incredible damn story.

Biggest Sucker Picks: UConn (22), BYU (20), Virginia (17), and Texas (29) took out most of today's losers. UConn I don't have a witty joke for. At Virginia, Tony Bennett is really committed to having the most bizarre NCAA Tournament record imaginable, losing a 1v16 match-up, winning a title, and then losing a 4v13 over the last 3 Tourneys, well played Tony. Not to be outdone, Shaka Smart is doing his best to make everyone forget about that Final 4 at VCU in 2011, since then Shaka's longest Tournament stays have been two 2nd round losses in 2012 and 2013....yikes. Meanwhile, BYU and their team full of 28 year old Mormons just seemed like they didn't want to deal with quarantining in Indiana and preferred to be back in Utah with their kids and wife(s)...this is a polygamy joke, but since players was pluralized, wives would have naturally been pluralized as well, so I used wife(s) to joke that individual players could have multiple wives. Look, it's funny, don't overthink it.

Most Popular Winners: It was pretty chalky for the most popular picks today, I mean, other than people that trusted Shaka Smart. USC (40), FSU (32), and Kansas (30) were the most popular picks on the day, and all three moved on to Monday.

All in all, we started the day with 352 combatants re-entering the arena, as the final game ended we have 227 combatants moving on to Sunday and Round 2. That means we thinned out another 35% of the remaining players on Saturday. Best of luck to everyone still alive!

2021 Survivor Pool Day 1 Recap

 It's been two long, cold, bloody years. But we're officially back in business and day one of the NCAA Tournament is in the books! I'm so excited!

Leaderboard Link

Day 2 Pick Sheet Link

We ended up with 576 entries this year. Down a bit from 2019, but still leads to a prize pool just shy of $12,000. The Pool is nationwide these days, but still has a Louisville metro flavor. Not having Louisville, Kentucky, or Indiana in the Tournament definitely hurt the numbers. But, you aren't here for talk of teams not in The Tournament. You're here to have a fun recap of the Survivor Pool's first day! Or, more likely, you're my mom and you're just sort of reading for the same reason parents hang macaroni art on their fridge for a few months until they don't feel guilty throwing it away. So, let's get to it!

Upset of the Day...That meant nothing: ORAL ROBERTS BEAT OHIO STATE! And no one cared. Only 9 people played the chalk here and bit the dust. Meanwhile not a single person had the guts to pick The Oral Roberts Fightin Evangelical Preachers. Cowards, every one of you. 

Today's Biggest Loser: I was going to make an Indiana joke here, something along the lines of, "The biggest loser today didn't even play a game..." You know, then maybe post that clip from The Office where David Wallace called Michael Scott a nice guy but said he was never really being considered from the promotion to Corporate drawing a parallel to Stevens basically telling IU, "You're a nice guy, but....". I had it all planned out. But, that would be a cheap shot, and I'm above that. It's not like I couldn't find the aforementioned clip quickly on YouTube so I just moved on. Nope, I Just have a little more integrity than that. Instead the biggest losers today were...PURDUE! That's right, the Boilermakers, in a sign of solidarity with their Indiana brothers, decided if some people in Indiana were going to have a bad day, EVERYONE in Indiana would have a bad day. Despite basically playing at home, Purdue lost and took down 36 entries with them. The star of the game? Not Javion Hamlet with his 24 points....it was Javion Hamlet's dad that won my heart. Move over Sister Jean, there's a new superfan in town!

Upsets of the Day That Did Matter: Tennessee got smoked by Oregon State and took down 44 entries with them. Oregon State, despite being terrible at basketball the entire season, has suddenly discovered the secret to basketball is simply outscoring their opponents, and 5 people believed in them and move on with 12 tie-breaker points. Another 35 combatants took an L in game one today trusting Virginia Tech, though this is a classic gamble game, shoot your shot on Game 1 and if you lose you can always re-buy later if you're not a total coward. Still, only 10 people took a shot with Florida in the opening day match-up, so it was a heavy VaTech lean, nice job James Surowiecki. 

Gutsiest Loser: Always love when we have ONE pick on a team, today that happened with mmidland5 and Liberty. If you're gonna lose, you might as well lose on a 13 seed by yourself. Really though, I thought Liberty was a sleeper pick for people. Thought more people would fall on that sword.

People's Champion: Loyola of Chicago has gone from Cinderella a few years back to a veritable belle of the ball. There were 68 people that trusted The Fightin Sister Jean's to move them on to day two. And Sister Jean didn't let em down. Big day for religion in general as the nun will be joined in round to by some Evangelicals and Baptists that are also moving on. Of course, the Jesuits are lying in wait for tomorrow.

Other Popular Winners: Rutgers might not have made it to the Tournament since 1983, but 43 contestants weren't deterred by that 38 year absence, and like a fine wine Rutgers was aged, had a nice oaky finish, and got the W. This was another heavily skewed 7-10 match-up, with just 4 suckers going down with the Clemson ship. Texas Tech, and the new target of Indiana's affection, Chris Beard, moved 44 of our competitors to day two, again, just 4 suckers backed the loser, Utah State. The final popular winner was West Virginia. The Mountaineers were the final bastion of safety for people looking to get a late entry through, and the final winner of the night moved on a whopping 60 entries!

You can't spell Lose without WINthrop...wait: That's right, Winthrop was a popular play for people looking to grab some sweet tie breaker points. We had 26 entries thinking they could outsmart the best coach in college basketball because he was missing one player. Betting against Jay Wright in March isn't a good move y'all. The Villanova win advanced 27 entries, this was the most most evenly split game of the day, which is a kind of cool fact I guess.

With Day 1 in the books we've already lost 224 entries. That means 39% of the Survivor Pool entries have already gone up in smoke. This leaves 352 live entries to move on to Day 2 where more Madness awaits!