The NCAA Tournament Had A Spectacular Friday

The amazing thing about the NCAA tournament is that it is so pure and that it's pure in a sport that is decidely not pure at all.

All of that gets put aside for moments like we saw Saturday:

St. Joe's winning when a controversial dunk is waved off. Middle Tennessee not just beating but manhandling Michigan State. Who ever dreamed that could happen?

But all of it - everything we've seen so far - pales before the greatest NCAA buzzer beater since Christian Laettner's epic shot against Kentucky.

Northern Iowa's Paul Jesperson hit a shot from behind the halfcourt line to beat Texas that is already legendary. It's that incredible. If you haven't seen it yet you should go now. It was incredible and by far the play of the tournament to date. Possibly the tournament play of the century so far.

It was pretty much the shot that Butler's Gordon Hayward nearly hit against Duke in 2010, just going the other way and with less of a straight line to get it off.

For the first time ever, a 13, 14 and 15 seed all won on Saturday.

We didn't do very well, but after all of that, who the hell cares?

We missed Middle Tennessee State badly - Michigan State was our pick for the national champs. Ooops. It's fair to say this: the Blue Raiders were stunning. They pushed Michigan State around. Honestly, Middle Tennessee State really punked the Spartans. In our wildest dreams we never thought that was possible.

That team has serious free throw issues, so don't get your hopes up too much. You aren't going to far shooting 61% from the line - the games always get tighter and free throws are critical. But what a win!

We did get Oregon over Holy Cross and Villanova over Asheville, and Oklahoma over a tough Bakersfield.

We missed on Syracuse over Dayton and VCU over Oregon State and we thought Cal would take Hawai'i.

We did get Iowa over Temple and Maryland but didn't have the guts to follow our instincts here.

We were correct about Texas A&M over Green Bay, Oregon over Holy Cross, Xavier topping Weber State and Notre Dame beating Michigan. But we just barely missed on Cincinnati.

Oh well, live and learn. So look at where the ACC stands in comparison to the Big 12, the Big Ten and the PAC 12. These teams are out:

The Big 12

1. Baylor
2. West Virginia
3. Texas
4. Texas Tech

Big Ten

1. Purdue
2. Michigan State
3. Michigan

PAC 12

1. Arizona
2. Colorado
3. USC
4. Cal
5. Oregon State

ACC

1. Pitt.

Things could change tomorrow, but Duke, UNC, Virginia, Miami, Notre Dame and Syracuse all advanced. That's pretty solid - especially compared to some other conferences.

Virginia was probably up late writing thank-you notes to Middle Tennessee State for knocking Michigan State out of the way. The bracket looks a lot better for Virginia than it did Friday morning.