On Tuesday, March 18, the 2025 NCAA Tournament, more commonly known as March Madness, began. As of Thursday, March 27, the first three rounds have been played out, and the reviews are in: we’re bored.
First Four Round
The first four games of the tournament featured teams that needed to win to earn their bid. This includes the controversial North Carolina team, who many believe should not have made the final field of 68.
Some notable moments include Alabama State’s last-second full-court heave to defeat Saint Francis and win their first March Madness game in school history, North Carolina crushing San Diego State and proving their worth in the tournament, and Xavier squeezing out a 13-point comeback to defeat Texas.
These first four games actually seemed to increase hype for the tournament to continue, as three of the games were close and very entertaining to watch.
Round of 64
On Thursday, March 20, the 64 final teams began their journey towards the title. Here are some highlights from the first round:
- 12-seed McNeese upsets 5-seed Clemson, despite late-game surge of scoring from Clemson.
- 8-seed Gonzaga, 2-seed Saint John’s, and 7-seed UCLA blow out 9-seed Georgia, 15-seed Omaha, and 10-seed Utah State respectively.
- 10-seed Arkansas upsets 7-seed Kansas, giving Kansas their first Round of 64 loss since 2006.
- Every single 1, 2, 3, and 4-seed won their game, meaning that 12-seed McNeese (and Colorado State) were the lowest seed to move on.
- 12-seed Colorado State upsets 5-seed Memphis, a team many believed could make a deep run.
- 3-seed Iowa State, 4-seed Maryland, 4-seed Arizona, and 5-seed Oregon all blow out their opponents.
- 10-seed New Mexico upsets 7-seed Marquette by 9 points.
As you can tell, not a lot of great moments! Just teams who were expected to win, well, winning. No buzzer-beaters, no crazy upsets, and no exciting matchups. This year saw the highest number of perfect brackets remaining after the Round of 64 (around 36,000) since 2019, undoubtedly due to the predictability of the outcomes. But maybe the second round will have more in store for us!
Round of 32
The Round of 32 began on Saturday, March 22 and ended the next day. This round was more exciting than the Round of 64, but also less exciting. Here are this round’s big moments:
- 12-seed McNeese’s run ends against Purdue.
- 10-seed Arkansas continues their run by upsetting 2-seed Saint John’s, a team that 16% of all brackets had in their final four.
- 6-seed BYU barely slips by 3-seed Wisconsin, 91-89.
- 1-seed Houston ends 8-seed Gonzaga’s streak of consecutive Sweet 16 appearances, dating back 9 years. Houston now holds the longest active streak.
- 1-seed Florida barely makes it out against the back-to-back champs (8-seed UConn), 77-75.
- 4-seed Maryland hits the first (yes, the only) buzzer beater of the tournament to send 12-seed Colorado State packing.
This round saw more close games that had more stakes. It also had a buzzer beater, which is what March is about. The problem is that the teams are still predictable. Florida and Houston made it closer than we’d think, but Duke and Auburn still completely destroyed their opponents.
In the grand scheme of things, the tournament has been fun. Watching the Terrapins make their first Sweet 16 since 2016, Arkansas running the gauntlet, and BYU threatening the pool of remaining teams are all notable moments. However, the majority of games have been boring, filled with commercials, and done-deals at half. We can only hope that the strength of the higher seeds will provide us with some great basketball in the later rounds. However, this year’s March is lacking the madness.
As for the Women’s tournament, the same story takes place. All of the higher seeds crushed their earlier opponents, and the competition is dwindling down. UConn, behind Paige Bueckers, is making another run, but teams like South Carolina and TCU still look unstoppable. The most notable events was 1-seed USC’s JuJu Watkins suffering a season-ending ACL injury in the second round, and 4-seed Maryland’s comeback double-overtime victory against Alabama.