THE RECKONING

My brackets are in ruins. All 9 of them. The Big East collapsed, claiming St. John's, Villanova, Notre Dame, Louisville, Pittsburgh, West Virginia, Cincinnati, Penn State, even Syracuse. The underdogs were not dogged enough. Temple showed spunk but just ran out of luck. Two of my Final Four selections are gone. Only Duke and BYU remain and may still not disappoint me.

And I was doing so well, too. After Saturday, I was in the 92nd percentile of the ESPN.com Bracket Challenge, by far the most populated bracket game, with well over 5 million participants. As of last night I am in the middle of the 47th percentile, some 3.019 million back in the pack. According to ESPN last night, no participant has a perfect score after 3 rounds, so at least all of this year's players have tasted some defeat.

Yeah, a saving grace. That's what I'm telling myself. But when you're this far back in the pack, the view stays the same. Yech.

We're Talkin' BRACKETS. BRACKETS!

Yup, it's that time of year again, and I have gone bracket crazy. At this moment I think I've filled out 9 brackets for the Men's 2011 version of March Madness, the world's best tournament.

And the prizes are bigger than ever, from smartphones to iPads and other tablets to 55" Samsung HDTVs to a cool million of those American dollars . Here's where you, too, can test your skill at bracketology:



CBS Sports.com

ESPN

The Sporting News

Yahoo Sports

AOL Sports/Fanhouse

Slack's Hoagie Shack

The Trentonian

P.C. Richard & Sons

WFAN, NYC



This year, as you may have by now heard, it's 68 teams in the mix, and play begins tomorrow night (Tuesday), so get your picks in, pigeons!

I love this time of year.
How do you think you'll do?
Post your brackets, if you dare.