Mid-Major Madness Mascot Melee: First Round recap and updated bracket

The 64-mascot field in the 2017 Mid-Major Madness Mascot Melee has been cut in half.

Of the 32 remaining mascots, only 17 were the higher seed in their first-round matchups. Upsets — or, more likely, my own poor job at seeding — has completely busted the bracket.

Here’s a breakdown of who advanced:

• All four 1 seeds
• Only two 2 seeds (Scrappy from North Texas and Norm from Charlotte pulled off huge upsets)
• Two 12 seeds, showing yet again that those 5-12 games are truly unpredictable
• In one of those matchups, 12 seed Thunder beat Big Blue from Utah State. The Grand Canyon mascot received 568 out of 896 total votes. No matchup in the entire field had more responses.
• Highlander beat YouDee by just four votes in the closest matchup of the First Round, 215-211.
• Most of the mascots to wage massive Twitter voting campaigns advanced, including Peter the Anteater, Magnus, Pete the Penguin, and Chattanooga’s Scrappy. Wolfie and Shadow were not as fortunate.

Full bracket:

Ben Goren #ReadBenGoren

Voting for the Second Round is now open and will remain open until Friday night. You can vote using the form below. If you’re reading this on your phone and are having trouble viewing, you can also vote here.