Updated March Madness bracket: Sweet 16 set

The first weekend of the NCAA Tournament is complete and the Sweet 16 matchups are set in the latest update to the March Madness bracket.

The upsets came fast and furious in the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament, which wrapped up with brackets across the country completely torched. A massive egg laid by the Big Ten, which has seen eight of its nine teams get eliminated already, was a significant factor in the carnage.

Ohio State and Purdue were upset on the first night while Illinois got tripped up by a Loyola-Chicago team it probably shouldn’t have played that soon thanks to a poor seeding decision from the Selection Committee. Iowa got blitzed by Oregon in the Round of 32, knocking out the Hawkeyes while the Pac-12 had a tremendous weekend, going 9-1 to send four of its five teams to the Sweet 16.

Another surprising performer in the first two rounds was Syracuse, which shut up its critics by knocking off San Diego State and West Virginia to advance to the Sweet 16. The Orange are beneficiaries of the Illinois upset, seeing a potential path to the Final Four if they can get past Houston and either Loyola-Chicago or Oregon State.

The heavy favorites remain Gonzaga and Baylor, who took care of their first two opponents with ease. The Bulldogs and Bears have been a notch above everyone else all season long and have very reasonable paths to the Final Four. Check out the full updated bracket below.

What March Madness matchups are the most appealing in the Sweet 16?

The avalanche of upsets has created a few lopsided matchups, which could add some blowout potential to the Sweet 16. The best matchups on paper come from the East Region where Michigan takes on a game Florida State team while Alabama gets a test from red-hot UCLA, which has won three games to get out of the First Four and into the Sweet 16.

One matchup that could fly under the radar is Baylor’s showdown against Villanova in the South Region. Jay Wright has done a good job getting the Wildcats through the first weekend without their best player, the injured Collin Gillespie, and Villanova has enough talent to give the Bears a big scare.

Surely, we haven’t seen the last of these upset-minded teams.

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