According to ESPN, “It keeps you up at night and consumes every minute, of the month of March. You will leave work to see if it is correct. It creates a diversion from your girlfriend’s constant nagging….This is the March Madness Bracket.” It is that time of year again and everyone is in an uproar of stats and probability to see who will win each individual game and reach the Final Four. The Sunday before the opening games, television stations were interrupting the local channels, to show who got what seed and see the predictions from the professional analysts. Celebrities, athletes, and even the President of the United States filled out a bracket. Manual students, just like all of the other high school students, were no exception to the obsession.

Teachers, administrators, janitors, and mostly all of the students filled out brackets. Some people just fill them out of curiosity to see how close they can get to having every game right. Other people fill out multiple brackets, with different choices and mixes of opponents. Even at Manual, there was a bracket pool in the school between all the teachers. Some people aren’t that excited about all the bracket action. Mr. Matthew Kingsley (Assistant Principle) said, “I really don’t care, I love basketball and I love watching certain teams and certain conferences, but I just do not have the time to fill out a bracket and follow the teams. There are some other people who want to fill out a bracket, but don’t know that much about basketball and find ways to give their guesses. Elli Toninni (12) picked all of her teams based on the colors, which one looked better, and then choose that team to move on.

All Manual students continue to watch the tournament, just to see how far the University of Kentucky will go, since this is the first time they have made it to the Final Four since 1998, under Tubby Smith. Many are hoping they will win it all, but after the championship ends hopefully we will be able to go back to normal, at least until next years tournament.