Dick Jerardi | Opening rounds not too upsetting

0 Comments | Philadelphia Daily News, March, 2007

CHICAGO - After 48 games in 4 days, some truths have become self-evident. The old sage John Chaney's favorite phrase is "truth to power." Well, this was "truth of power."

The top five seeds got through to the second round for just the second time since the tournament expanded to 64 teams in 1985. There were just two seed upsets in the 32 first-round games (forget 8-9 stuff) and, really, Winthrop (11) over Notre Dame (6) and VCU (11) over Duke (6) were not huge upsets.

The 18 one-bid leagues were 2-16 in the first round. Only Memphis (C-USA) and Winthrop (Big South) broke through. It was probably not a coincidence that they were the only two teams not to lose a conference game. The six two-bid leagues went 6-6. The...