March Madness NCAA Sweet 16 is set

The first and second round of the NCAA March madness tournament is in the books with the Sweet 16 round set to begin next Thursday, March 27th, 2008.

In the East bracket the #1 seed North Carolina will face off with #4 seed Washington State. Washington State destroyed the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame in the second round after crushing Winthrop in round one. North Carolina who is the number one seed overall in the entire tournament has two easy blowouts, the last Sunday when Carolina absolutely toyed with Arkansas.

In the other East matchup it will be Tennessee who survived overtime with Butler and got a scare from American in round one against a Louisville squad who blew out Oklahoma and Boise State in the opening rounds.

The Midwest bracket continued to field upsets as 10th seed Davidson shocked Georgetown after the Hoyas led by as many as 17 points. They had already beaten 7th seeded Gonzaga. Davidson will now face Wisconsin who stopped Michael Beasley and Kansas State in round two after handling CS-Fullerton in the opener.

Villanova who is seeded number 12 took care of 13th seed Siena in a game of underdogs after overcoming a huge deficit in the opener against Clemson. Villanova will now face the number one ranked Jayhawks of Kansas who took care of UNLV on Saturday after blowing out Portland State in round one.

In the South the lowest seed is Michigan State who led against Pittsburgh most of the game and came away with a convincing win after handling Temple in the opener. The 5th seeded Spartans will now take on top seed Memphis who ran away from Texas Arlington in the opener but was tested with a close scare against Mississippi State.

Stanford who blew out Cornell in round one survived Marquette in overtime on a last second tip in and will face off with Texas who controlled Miami the entire game although Miami made it interesting during the last minute of the game. Texas was not tested in the opener against Austin Peay.

The West bracket also has a number 12 seed in the Sweet 16 because Western Kentucky took care of 13th seed San Diego after beating Drake on a final buzzer beater shot in the first round. Western Kentucky will take on number one seed UCLA who may have been exposed by Texas A&M but survived in the final seconds as a 10 point favorite.

Bob Huggins is back in the Sweet 16 this time with West Virginia after the Mountaineers used a second half run to upset the number two seed Duke. West Virginia who is a number 7 seed will face off against the number 3 seed Xavier who beat Purdue and Georgia in the opening rounds.