Dick Vitale says Louisville will win the national championship at the Georgia Dome on April 8.
Kei, an 8 1/2-year-old Atlantic bottlenose dolphin showing his bias for the ocean, says the winner will be San Diego State.
Vitale wasn’t impressed.
“Bet on that, you’d own the aquarium,” Vitale said.
Vitale was at the Georgia Aquarium on Tuesday to put his college basketball acumen to the test against 11 dolphins. The winner will be decided by whomever picked the most games correctly. Should Vitale win, he will receive a lifetime membership to the aquarium. Should the dolphins win the bet, Vitale will be their personal assistant.
Vitale is confident that’s not going to happen.
“Dolphins are phenomenal in the water, but I think they’ve been in the water too long looking at some of the teams they picked,” he joked.
Vitale’s Final Four, which will be played April 6, had a Big Ten theme with Indiana, Michigan and Ohio State. However, his fourth team isn’t from the Big Ten and he says will be champion: Louisville, the tournament’s top seed and the team he said will beat Indiana.
“I think Rick Pitino has that magical way at tournament time to get his players to understand the one-and-done,” Vitale said. “The one-and-done scenario is such a challenge. It’s unique. The NBA plays four out of seven. You have a bad night, you get to make it up. One bad night in college basketball, party is over.”
The dolphins’ picks were slightly different. The trainers would throw two balls of different colors into the pool. Each ball represented a team. The ball that came back was counted as the pick. Dolphins are colorblind (other than the ability to see some shades of blue) so there was no prejudice toward certain colors.
The dolphins’ Final Four was composed of UNLV, San Diego State, Creighton and Iowa State, with San Diego State, the 26th overall seed, defeating Iowa State in the championship game.
“No way their picks will be beat mine,” he crowed.
After picking against the Dolphins, which officially is titled the Allstate March Mayhem Challenge, Vitale broke down his bracket and plugged his book, “Getting a W in the Game of Life.”
He said he picked three Big Ten teams to make the Final Four because of the strength of the conference and not the luck of the draw.
“They’ve clearly been the best conference in basketball,” he said. “Obviously there are a lot of teams that can win two games, but winning six games you separate the pretenders from the contenders. I think the Big Ten has five potential teams that can win six games in a row.
As for upsets, Vitale said watch out for Davidson and South Dakota State, which he said could upset Michigan if the Wolverines aren’t careful.
The dolphins agreed with Vitale on the Davidson pick, selecting the Wildcats to upset Marquette.
“Losing to dolphins, if that happens I’m in trouble,” he said.
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