NCAA bracket predictions 2017: My mom and my dog give their takes

When filling out your NCAA Tournament bracket, it never hurts to seek input — both from experts and non-experts alike.

I posted my bracket over on .com earlier, but even after the post went live, I wasn’t terribly confident. Sure, I poured over KenPom’s numbers, thought back to watching most of these teams live, heck I even consulted the RPI (lol no). And when I was really desperate, I decided to #ReadBenGoren and get his bracketing advice.

It wasn’t enough.

I had to ask my mom and my dog who they were choosing. What follows are their brackets with a little bit of analysis around how they arrived at some of their major decisions.

My mom

Name: Lori
Age: [REDACTED]
Location: Connecticut

Bracket:

Analysis:

My mom had a few things to say about some of her picks, and to be honest, I think these are all fair points.

On Providence: “I watched them. They sucked!”

On Butler: “I have to stay true to those Bulldogs.”

On Duke: “They just win everything. They get it together.”

On Kansas: “They’re very good.”

On Louisville: “You can’t miss with Rick Pitino.”

On Dayton: “Yeah, that one.”

All very true. When asked to comment on her bracket as a whole, she said, “I’m not a dum-dum!”

My dog:

Name: Annie
Age: 2 (14 dog years)
Location: Connecticut
Status: Very good dog, sometimes mischievous
Breed: Take a guess:

Bracket:

Analysis:

“I’m a dog so I took the dog teams and picked the cat teams to lose. I like SMU because they’re the Mustangs and sometimes I think I’m a pony. I do not like Miami because I am afraid of storms. I like Oregon because even though I’ve never met a duck they would probably fascinate me. I also have a love-hate relationship with birds, so I tended to pick against the avian mascots. Also I am a dog. Butler ranks 17th in the nation in offensive efficiency and I have a crush on Trip.”