MARCH MADNESS, DAY FOUR

They've whittled it down from 65 teams to 16. The Sweet Sixteen. Five of them from The Big East. All number 1 seeds advanced.

For the first time since the NCAA expanded the tournament field in 1985, each of the 12 teams seeded Nos. 1-3 advanced to the Sweet 16. So much for upset cities and crazy bracket picks.

So what was the most impressive win on Sunday? Most people seemed to think going in that 6th seeded Marquette's guard play would overwhelm 3rd seeded Missouri. Kim English scored 15 points off the bench in about 8 seconds during one unbelievable spurt and finished the game with two clutch free throws to win.

To be honest, none of the other games, even what for me, was the game I was most interested, Syracuse against Arizona State, were that thrilling. No extremely tight, see-saw sort of games that kept you edge of your seat.

So rather than recap the obvious in the absence of tight games and upsets, I'm just going to move forward and rank/update my Final Four but before I do that I will note that in the NYT bracket I had 13 of the 16. In the SN bracket, I had 13 as well. What's that mean? Nothing. Plenty of people did as well or better.

1. U CONN: granted, it was only Chattanooga and Texas A&M, but they still beat them both by a combined 82 points. Purdue is up next having topped Northern Iowa and Washington. Should U Conn do the expected, they will face:

2. Memphis: Sloppy against Cal State Northridge but demolished Maryland quite impressively perhaps the most impressive victory of the 2nd round. They face Missouri next which will be the most exciting match ups ahead. Well, there's so many exciting match ups that's hard to state unequivocally but big, deep line ups, fast teams. Memphis' defence is the difference-maker here.

Now logically only one of these teams can make it to the Final Four, but whichever team doesn't will still be better than the remaining teams.

Naturally I've got to admit some anti-Duke and anti-North Carolina biases so perhaps it's not unexpected that I now believe in:

3. Villanova: Is this everyone's new dark horse? Yes, they lose the supposed "home court advantage" as they move from Philly to Boston. But they've beaten UCLA pretty impressively, (which wasn't even the best team) and have got Duke next then potentially face a lackluster Pitt who would be out already were it not for DeJuan Blair. Pitt can't even be guaranteed to get past 4th seeded Xavier let alone would be a Villanova team with momentum.

4. Michigan State: surprise. It's easy to say with hindsight that Michigan State, with their great coach in Izzo and their superlative bracket record, should have been the obvious pick in the Final Four all along, especially given their 2 seed. They have a slim advantage over

5. Louisville: They were one of the best and there have been no serious challenges so far. They do face a formidable test against 12 seed Arizona and considering its difficult to say with certainty that L'ville can win this game, you have to say the argument of their strength is diminished.

6. Syracuse: Again, in the interests of full disclosure, I have them in my Final Four anyway, so picking them here is a no-brainer. Oklahoma, as far as a I can tell, is a one man team with a suspect back court and nothing they've done to date would indicate any different. Thus, the Orangemen can get to the South bracket final against either UNC or Gonzaga. Can they beat UNC? It's a long shot and even though UNC wasn't blistering against LSU, I'm going to go crazy and say the difference to lead Syracuse will be a red-hot Eric Devendorf from the three point line.