tournament turmoil

Well, so far it's been a wacky set of girls basketball tournaments. Most interesting trend of the first two rounds, all three number-one seeds that had byes to the second round lost their opening game.
Wethersfield suffered a heartbreaking loss in a game it controlled most of the way to a very physical East Lyme team. I won't say the reffing was bad, but some of the Eagles have bruises on their arms from non-calls. Still, Wethersfield was sloppy, and the team that deserved to win has a game Friday night.
On the same night, Shepaug Valley lost to Coventry. I have to admit I had this one predicted, but it has to be a shock to a team to get the top seed and be ousted so quickly.
And then yesterday, in another commonly predicted game, Berlin outlasted East Hampton in overtime. Suffice it to say, the Shoreline Conference just wasn't that good. Old Lyme and East Hampton, two of the better teams (with the Bellringers undefeated on the year) in the league lost their only playoff games. Expect Morgan to be next.
Just to prove a point and settle an argument with one of my colleagues, who foolishly and ignorantly tells me I can't call the Shoreline Conference weak, the conference placed eight teams in the state tournament this year in girls basketball. After two rounds, only two of them remain, Cromwell in Class S and Morgan in Class M.
If you discount the game in which Cromwell and Coginchaug faced off against each other, the conference is sporting a not-so-fabulous record of 4-5 in the tournament. Look further and three of the wins came against teams from the Constitution State Conference, otherwise known as the tech league. Simply put, the CSC is a joke, and its teams never hold up against teams from other conferences. They are simply playing at a far lower level. The fourth win for the Shoreline was Morgan's 71-51 victory over Northwestern Regional, a team that advanced to the second round with a win over, you guessed it, a tech school, and has a losing overall record. That gives the Shoreline Conference exactly 0, read it again, 0 impressive wins in this tournament so far, and six losses. The numbers don't lie.

Back to the trend of top seeds losing. This says a couple things. First off, the seeds don't matter come tournament time. Matchups do. Secondly, there is something to be said for NOT getting a bye in the first round. All three of those teams had byes. Had they played somebody, it would have been a 32nd or 33rd seed that barely qualified for the tournament. In other words, it would have been a team any of them easily could have defeated.
But the significance is that they could have gotten the playoff jitters out against a weak opponent, rather than jump right in against a solid team like East Lyme, Coventry, or Berlin, which had already played one playoff game. Most of these teams had at least a week off between their conference tournaments and first state game. That's a lot of time to get rusty, and it showed.

Who can say what the quarterfinals and beyond will hold? Don't look to me. You should see the 'X' marks on my brackets. But at least I'm still clinging to a lead in the office pool.