March Madness is one of the largest, most anticipated and exciting sports event of the year. But what is March Madness? Here’s a breakdown of everything the event truly entails.

       Starting in 1939, March Madness is a basketball tournament, played mainly within the month of March, showcasing players in both the NCAA Division 1 Men and Women leagues.

      These are single-elimination tournaments, according to HowStuffWorks, which means that the championship team has to win at least six games in a row to claim the title. One loss and they’re going home.

       Unfortunately, only 68 men’s teams and 64 women’s teams are invited to participate by a selection committee, and the results are announced on ‘Selection Sunday,’ March 11th.

       Teams are selected based of a simple set of criteria: regular season record, wins versus ranked opponents, ranking in national polls, and their Rating Percentage Index, (RPI).

       HowStuffWorks explains that, “teams are divided into four geographical regions, each with 16 teams. Every team is assigned a ‘seed’ number of one through sixteen with the best team in the region award the No. 1 seed.”

      After the committee assigns the seeds, it places the top four teams in each region to a first/second round site that is most geographically compatible to those teams. The four champions from each region comprise the ‘Final Four.’

      Over the first two days of the tournament, the 64 teams are paired to 32. In the following two days, that number is trimmed to a mere 16, also known as the ‘Sweet Sixteen.’

      During the second week of the tournament, those 16 teams battle it out until only 8 still stand, (the Elite Eight). Then finally, the four remaining teams go head-to-head as the ‘Final Four.’

       Throughout the entire month, “many fans fill out bracket forms to try and guess the order of the 64 teams, all the way to the winner,” says HowStuffWorks.

       Senior Grahme Akehurst, who’s been playing varsity basketball all throughout high school, is betting on, “Michigan State to go all the way.” And Senior Jake Helewicz also has Michigan State winning it all, however he states, “UMD is my favorite team, because I’m a hometown fan.”

       While Junior Sophia Sturgill on the other hand, wants “either North Carolina or Kentucky to take the championship title.”

       Build the perfect bracket and stay tuned to see who comes out on top on April 2nd.