NEW YORK — Better luck picking next year, Mr. President.
A
day after his bracket was busted by Kansas' stunning loss to Northern
Iowa, President Barack Obama went 5-3 in the men's NCAA Tournament
on Sunday.
He has only nine teams remaining in
the round of 16, but five of his final eight are still playing. Obama
ranks 341,262nd on ESPN.com's leaderboard, putting him in the top 92.9
percent of users who made picks on the Web site.
That
ranking is likely to drop next weekend as the tournament continues,
because of the Jayhawks' 69-67 loss Saturday. Obama picked Kansas — as
did 42.2 percent of ESPN users — to win it all, with the Jayhawks
beating Kentucky.
Obama's women's bracket
also took a hit Sunday when he lost seven of the first 12 games, but
rebounded in the four late matchups to finish 9-7. He ranked 106,679th,
better than 44 percent among ESPN users.
His
round of 16 is still intact, except for No. 6 seed Texas, which lost to
11th-seeded San Diego State 74-63 in the Memphis Regional on Sunday.
Obama
played it mostly safe with the women's bracket on the first day,
picking the better seeds in all but one of the 16 games. It also ended
up being his only loss as No. 10 seed North Carolina fell to
seventh-seeded Gonzaga 82-76. Obama was tied for first with many others
until the Tar Heels' loss.
He went with much
the same picking approach for the second-day games — taking 13 of 16
higher seeds — but it didn't work out nearly as well.
The
First Fan's women's Final Four includes all No. 1 seeds: Connecticut,
Tennessee, Stanford and Nebraska. He has Connecticut, which has won a
women's NCAA-record 73 straight games, beating Stanford for the title.