Wildcats survive scare and Nicholas hits shocker

In a NCAA Tournament weekend that saw the Cincinnati Bearcats coach and radio announcer, and another team's mascot get ejected, there weren't as many upsets as in past years. However, there was not a lack of suspense as many of the top teams were sent to the brink of elimination, including the number one seeded Arizona Wildcats, the number two seeded Wake Forest Demon Deacons and the defending national champion Maryland Terrapins.

While CBS claimed the first day of the tournament on Thursday was full of great finishes and shocking upsets, there were no real upsets. The first day's biggest anomaly came with the Tulsa Golden Hurricane's 84-71 victory over the fourth seeded Dayton and the Central Michigan Chippewas' 79-73 win over the sixth seeded Creighton Blue Jays. In most cases a 4-13 or a 6-11 upset is a pretty big deal, but not with these teams. Though Creighton was hailed as the media's mid-major darling all year long, it wasn't made for the tournament. No one really expects Creighton to win the national title. In the case of the Dayton v. Tulsa game, Dayton has to go down in the books as the worst four seed in tournament history. Dayton should have been lower then a four and Tulsa should have been higher than a 13. Both of these picks were two of the most common upsets picked by bracket junkies around the nation.

After a rather dull first day (by NCAA upset tradition), the second day was marked by two mid-major upsets and one shot that will go down in tournament lore. The first mid-major team to pull an upset was the Utah Utes over the Oregon Ducks of the Pac-10, by a score of 60-58. Oregon trailed all game long, even by as many as 15 at one point, but was able to crawl back to tie the game with less than a minute left. After Utah's Nick Jacobson sank two free throws with 14.4 seconds left, Oregon's James Davis missed two three pointers with time running down. Though technically a mid-major upset, after all these years of tournament dominance and with past stars like Keith Van Horn, Andre Miller, and Michael Doleac, Utah really shouldn't be viewed as a mid-major anymore.

In the South Region on Friday night, 6th seed Maryland won a thriller over the 11th seeded UNC Wilmington Seahawks, 75-73. With five seconds remaining and down by one point, Maryland guard Drew Nicholas drove the length of the court and launched a fade away three pointer as time expired.

The swish shot, which continued the Terrapins' attempt to defend last year's national championship, will surely go down in tournament history with Christian Laettner's "shot heard round the world" and Tyus Edny's full court drive -- even more memorable if Maryland moves onto truly defending their national title at the Final Four.

The first, and only real upset of the first round occurred in the East Region in the 5-12 game. Butler's Bulldogs defeated the Mississippi St. Bulldogs 47-46 as mid-major Butler vindicated its at-large selection to the tournament, snubbed last year after it was left out of the NCAA tournament even with 25 wins. The selection committee was not going to make the same mistake twice, so despite not winning their conference tournament, the Butler Bulldogs were given an at-large bid over some of the mediocre major conference teams.

In one of the best games of the tournament to date, Arizona defeated the Gonzaga Bulldogs 96-95 in double overtime to move into the Sweet Sixteen. In a classic back and forth game, both teams traded leads throughout the finals two minutes of regulation and both overtimes.

Gonzaga's Blake Stepp had the chance to make a leaner to win the game with two seconds left, but he laid it up just a little too hard. Despite the loss, Gonzaga proved once again that it can run with the big boys even after it loses its best players to graduation year after year.

The second round Midwest Region bout between the Marquette Golden Eagles and the Missouri Tigers finished as another of the tournament's top battles thus far. Marquette won 101-92 in overtime in a game where Dwayne Wade and Travis Deiner combined for 50 points. Additionally, the Eagles hit all eleven of their shots in overtime including going 3-3 from behind the arc and 6-6 from the free throw line. Overall, the tournament has gone relatively according to seeding through the first two rounds. There were only eight lower seeded winners in the first round, with five of those eight wins coming in either closely matched 8-9 or 7-10 games, which are basically toss-ups. No number one, two, or three seeds were upset in the first round. Even the Big East and Big Ten, two conferences that many thought were weak this year, were a combined 9-0 after the first round.