March is finally here and while most believe this month is about skipping all your classes on the first weekend of the NCAA tournament, it’s really about proving to the world you are smarter than all your friends.

That’s why we at The Badger Herald sports department decided to fill out our own brackets, not for the sake of sharing our knowledge, but for the sake of proving once and for all who is the superior sportswriter.

Check out some of the staff’s picks below:

Nick Brazzoni — Sports editor

There are three simple rules to follow when filling our your bracket each year. They are:

1. Always put an 11-seed in the Sweet 16 (Wichita State)
2. Always put an orange team in the Elite 8 (Texas)
3. Always put Michigan State in the Final Four (Michigan State)

This is probably why I never win any of my bracket pools, but this year I have a really good feeling about my picks. Also, Duke losing in the first round is a lock this year. Make sure you do that. They only have five players that can actually play basketball.

Eric Goldsobel — Sports content editor

Did I grow up 20 minutes from Stony Brook? Yes. Is my dad an alumnus? Yes. Am I biased? No, because Jameel Warney is the next great person to come out of the 631 since LL Cool J, Bob Costas and the Karate Kid himself, Ralph Macchio. There is no team that will put more heart out on the court than the Brook, who’ve had their hearts broken by losing the America East Tournament Championship four out of the five prior years. Are they good enough to beat Michigan State in the Final Four? Probably not, the Seawolves are bound to run out of gas by that point. But expect them to be the next George Mason, VCU-type team.

In the end, Kansas will win it all because, well, they’re really good, Perry Ellis is secretly a 30-year old man throwing beat downs on college kids and if you get in Wayne Selden’s way, he’ll do this to you:

Zac Hepps — Associate sports editor

The key to my bracket this year was trying to catch big upsets. To diversify your bracket from the chalk spewed all over ESPN, I doubled down on a couple of teams I thought would do poorly. 

For example, I believe Miami is going to advance no further than the second round. Because I do not believe they are Sweet 16 caliber, I had them losing in the first round to try and steal an upset. It isn’t about Buffalo being a better team, it is about my distrust in the Hurricanes. I would already have them losing in the round of 32, so why not go all in and secure a key 14-3 upset.

I also did this with Oregon in the second round and Xavier in the first round. 

Ben Cross — Men’s hockey writer

My perfect bracket is the way it is due to the massive unpredictability in this year’s tournament. I think the committee did a poor job seeding and, as a result, I put all my chips on the No. 6 seeds and a confusing Elite 8.

That being said, the top three No. 1 seeds have been some of the few I have any sort of confidence in this March, and I think this is the Virginia team that finally defeats the pesky Spartans. I’m sure this bracket will turn to shambles given the unfortunate amount of chalk I have in the first round, but I’m hoping my blind confidence will give me Warren Buffet’s solid billion.