A lot of people would opine that there is a tremendous Duke bias in the media.
I wonder if that kind of thing extends to filling out those NCAA Tournament brackets with a shot at $5 million on the line.
Indeed, how does a former Blue Devil and Dream team member, Christian Laettner, feel about the chances of his alma mater in the Big Dance?
Well, he's got them going to the Final Four, according to the bracket Laettner has filled out for the BetUS March Mayhem that is available for free at BetUS.com.
click to view Laettner's March Madness Bracket
Laettner, who led Duke to the national title in 1991 and 1992 and is one of the expert commentators on BetFlix, has Coach K's team getting through the South Regional, and it isn't a particularly arduous road. In the second round of action, he's got them playing a Louisville club that beat Syracuse twice but was flawed, and who Laettner believes will triumph over California in the opening round. The comes Purdue, which is minus its best player, Robbie Hummel (knee injury) and which got pounded by Minnesota in the Big Ten tournament (69-42), which gets to the Sweet 16, in his estimation, with wins over Siena and Texas A&M.
In the Elite Eight round, Laettner's bracket has Duke encountering, and beating, a Villanova squad that was hell on wheels in the early part of the season, but slowed down considerably down the stretch, though the Wildcats managed a #2 seed. That win would get them to Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.
Laettner has a lot of ACC teams advancing out of the first round. He predicts that Maryland will not only beat Conference USA champ Houston, but will also defeat 2009 national runner-up Michigan State to get to the Sweet 16, where they will be stopped in their tracks by Kansas. He also has Georgia Tech getting through one round in that same region (the Midwest) by beating Oklahoma State, then falling to Ohio State. Florida State, a ninth seed in the West, will beat Gonzaga in the opening round. Wake Forest is a #9 seed in the East that Laettner feels will get by #8 Texas, but he does not see them beating Kentucky in the next round. Clemson and Missouri are involved in a rather competitive first-round match that is also in the East, but he has Clemson advancing, at least to the second round of play, though no further.
Click here for March Madness Betting Lines.
Truth be told, Laettner was not that daring with upset specials, although there are indeed a couple of lower-seeded teams he sees moving past their first-round opponents. One of them is Florida, a #10 seed in the West Regional and a borderline choice to make this field as an at-large entrant, who plays BYU in a very tough opening-round assignment. Generally though, he's got teams playing to form; in his Elite Eight bracket all of the teams are either a #1 or #2 seed, except for Georgetown, which is third-seeded in the Midwest.
Lattner's Final Four consists of Kansas, Syracuse, West Virginia and Duke, which means he sees three top regional seeds and a #2 making it through. His Duke bias ends there, however, as he sees West Virginia winning the national semi-final game on April 3 in Indianapolis and moving on to the title game to face Kansas.
Who emerges when the dust clears? Why, it's the Jayhawks, the #1 overall seed in the tournament.
If he had a choice between winning the BetUS March Mayhem contest and Duke winning the national championship, even if that would make him a contest loser, I wonder what he would choose.
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