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2009 NCAA Tournament: First Round Recap
From 64 to 32

by Charlie Zegers

for About.com

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And then there were 32. Here's a recap of all the first round games of the 2009 NCAA Tournament.

Biggest Upset

The biggest Cinderella story thus far is easily Cleveland State over Wake Forest. This is the third time this season that the Vikings surprised the college hoops world by knocking off a highly-ranked opponent. First was Syracuse, who lost to Cleveland State when Cedric Jackson hit a 60-foot desperation heave at the buzzer. Next was Butler, dropped by the Vikings in the Horizon League final. Wake Forest, welcome to the club.

Near-Miss

Several of the top seeds struggled in their openers, but the biggest surprise was one seed Pittsburgh, who struggled to get by ETSU before finally winning by ten.

Honorable mention goes to Eric Maynor of VCU, whose attempted game-winner rimmed out in the UCLA game.

Biggest Shot

Siena's Ronald Moore hit a three to force a second overtime, then hit another three -- from the same spot, no less -- to beat Ohio State.

Biggest Non-story

While UConn was dismantling Chattanooga, Connecticut coach Jim Calhoun was in a Philadelphia hospital for tests. Any sudden trip to the hospital will raise concerns -- especially for a man that has has beaten cancer three times. But as of Friday morning, Calhoun was back with the team and feeling fine -- the official explanation for his illness was simple dehydration. Conspiracy theorists are already claiming that Calhoun faked the whole thing -- the last two times he missed an NCAA Tournament game due to illness, the Huskies went on to win the national championship.

Curious Use of the Home Court Advantage

Villanova, playing in Philadelphia, let American University hang around for far longer than expected. But that's nothing compared to Ohio State, who lost in the first round despite playing a virtual home game in Dayton.

Redemption Song

The critics had little love for the selection committee after they gave at-large bids to second-tier schools from BCS conferences over little guys like St. Mary's and Creighton... but Michigan, Wisconsin and Arizona all won their first-round games.

Top Player

Ben Woodside, we hardly knew ye. Woodside played all 40 minutes of North Dakota State's 84-74 loss to Kansas, single-handedly keeping the Bison in the game. He finished with 37 points.

Record by Conference

The Big 12 was undefeated in the first round, with all six teams advancing. The Big East went 6-1, with West Virginia the only casualty. And the Pac 10 went 5-1 -- Cal's loss to Maryland is the only blemish on their record.

The Big 10 went 4-3, and the ACC was an unimpressive 3-4, with only UNC, Duke and Maryland winning their first-round matchups. And the SEC's down year continued -- only three teams made the field, and LSU is the only one remaining after Tennessee and Southern Miss were lost their openers.

It was a one-and-done tournament for the America East, MAC, MEAC, MVC, Atlantic Sun, Mountain West, NEC, OVC, Big Sky, Patriot, Big South, SoCon, Big West, Southland, Colonial, Summit, Ivy and WAC. Conference USA (Memphis), the MAAC (Siena) and the WCC (Gonzaga) are batting 1.000.