WHERE WE STAND: THE LEADERBOARD

Sitting atop the leaderboard with 202 points each are Turn Yer Head to the Left and Acuff and SoarinOverWDW. Congratulations — you split the $100 bonus for leading after the First Round. Each of you gets 50 bucks, which is probably extremely unsatisfying for both of you but rules are rules. Both went on a tear in Round 1 and currently lead the 314-person field.

Hot on their heels: MKaras314 at 195, followed by a tie at 193 (Bracket in Time and FANTA Bracket).  And let's not overlook Wichmann, who has two brackets in the top 10, and who old-timers may recall actually won this thing TWICE in back-to-back years back in the day, briefly earning (good natured) villain status.  Anyhoo, here are the current standings at the top:

At the very bottom: meme bracket Bad Luck Brian is dead last with 94 points. Yeah, this guy:

Brian is by no means alone, however -- many of you are sucking wind.  The Confucious bracket is the worst of the humans, but he has multiple entries, so the worst bracket from someone that put all of their eggs in one basket belongs to... Serdula.  Pro-tip: if you're going to submit a positively dreadful bracket, maybe give it a clever moniker so you're not anchoring your family name to it.  Anyway, thank you as always for your contribution. :)

Here is the rest of the pack at the bottom as we enter Day 3:

Our celebrity and alternative methodology brackets are scattered appropriately across the standings. Bugs Bunny is currently in 6th place with 187 points, outperforming virtually every human who has submitted a bracket. Hannah Storm (172) is also performing respectably, ahead of her fellow media personalities.  And Jimmy Fallon, who has a long and storied history of being terrible at this, is actually turning is a decent performance as well.

On the other end of the spectrum: President Obama sits at 143, Jordan the Stallion is also at 143, and The Rizzler is down at 126. The Rizzler had the audacity to pick St. John's to the championship game and is being punished accordingly by the basketball gods. Andy Katz — the man who covers this tournament for a living — is sitting at a mortifying 130 points, currently 268th overall. Let's hope his contract isn't due for renewal any time soon.  

The ideological brackets are having a rough go of it. Red States (113) and Blue States (109) are both near the bottom, which either means the nation is unified in being bad at March Madness, or that both political parties simply cannot be trusted with a bracket. Coin Flip is at 107. If you're near Coin Flip, you are performing at coin-flip level. Big Yikes.

Here's what happened: seconds after Kentucky tied the game at 70, Santa Clara's freshman Allen Graves hit a 3-pointer with 2.4 seconds left to give the Broncos a 73-70 lead. Broncos coach Herb Sendek tried to call timeout to set the defense. The official didn't see it. Kentucky's Otega Oweh caught the inbound, raced upcourt, and banked in a 32-foot heave from just inside halfcourt as the buzzer sounded. Tied at 73. The place lost its mind. Enjoy this collection of reactions to the insane moment:

Santa Clara — making its first tournament appearance since 1996, back when Steve Nash was a senior — lost in overtime 89–84. Oweh finished with 35 points, 8 rebounds, and 7 assists, a Larry Bird–level statline. Meanwhile, Herb Sendek is somewhere watching that referee sprint up the court over and over again on a loop. The timeout that wasn't. The Broncos had three timeouts left. A call that, had it been granted, would have likely sent Santa Clara to the Round of 32 for the first time in 30 years. March can be cruel.

In the spirit of this pool: the Kentucky–Santa Clara game was Day 2's only truly chaotic basketball event. Everything else was either a blowout or a game that was never really in doubt in the final new minutes. Do we need to talk about the Mizzou game?  Let's not, actually.  Florida demolished Prairie View A&M 114–55, starting with an 18-0 run, going 65% from the field, and pulling starters before the 25-minute mark. Florida's starters were basically on vacation. Iowa State dropped 108 on Tennessee State. It was fine. Day 2 of basketball was — let's be honest — kinda underwhelming if you like upsets, but a lot of fun if you enjoy watching teams get brutalized, I guess.  Indeed, coming into today, a team had only scored more than 100 points 3 times, one of which was SLU on Thursday.  It happened three more times on Friday.

QUICK HITS

• Iowa State dropped 108 points on Tennessee State, but star Joshua Jefferson left with a scary injury late. He was seen in a walking boot thereafter.  Let's hope it's nothing serious, but that's never a great sign.

• Also notable: for the second year in a row, no 13-seed or lower won a first-round game. The little guys had a rough couple of days. The 12-seeds and 11-seeds did OK, but 13 through 16? Mostly very bad.