March Madness Is Here Again 

March Madness is the name given to the  National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) men’s basketball tournament.

The tournament decides college basketball’s national champion. Sixty-five teams are invited. Teams must win to advance in the tournament.  Games are played in cities across the country.

Teams are ranked from 1 to 16 based on how good they play.  Those rankings are also called “seedings.”

The number one seeds this year (the best teams going into the tournament) are Duke University, the University of Connecticut, Villanova University, and the University of Memphis.

Duke is in Durham, North Carolina and Connecticut is in Storrs, Connecticut.  Villanova is in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  Memphis is located in Memphis, Tennessee.

Three Wisconsin teams were invited

Three teams from Wisconsin were also invited.  Marquette University in Milwaukee finished fourth in its first year in the Big East Conference. It received a number seven seeding.

It played the number 10 seed University of Alabama in the tournament’s first round.  The school is located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

The last time Marquette played in the NCAA Tournament was 2003. That year, the Marquette Golden Eagles went to its Final Four.

The Final Four is the name given to the tournament’s last four remaining teams.

Wisconsin, UWM get bids

The University of Wisconsin in Madison finished fourth in the Big Ten Conference. However, the UW Badgers struggled late in the year. They got a number nine seed. They played number eight seed University of Arizona (Tucson, Arizona) in the first round of games.

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee also made the tournament. It won the Horizon League title. The Horizon League is the conference UWM plays in.

The UWM Panthers were an 11 seed. They played number six seed, the University of Oklahoma (Norman, Oklahoma).

It is UWM’s third NCAA appearance in four seasons. Last year, UWM won two games to advance to the Sweet 16.

The last 16 teams in the tournament make up the Sweet 16.

“We’ve got some more games to play,” UWM coach Rob Jeter said. “We’re going to make this thing go as long as we can. We don’t want to give this up.”

Sourc: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, ESPN.com