Due to unpopular demand, we are holding one-hour Chat Blocks every day this week. Here's the schedule (all times EDT): Monday at 3 pm, Tuesday at 2 pm, Wednesday at 1 pm, Thursday and Friday at 5 pm.

And don't forget about our bracket contest!

INDIANAPOLIS -- I see you printing out that CBS blank bracket at work, starting to fill it out in pencil. (You like Murray State's chances for the upset, I see.) I noticed that you'd opened a Fantasy account at ESPN,com, getting ready to fill out 10 different contingency entries. (But you're definitely hedging those bets on Murray State, aren't you?) Seriously, just stop right there. Don't do it. Sure, it's a shared experience with all your friends and online buddies, but stop. Do not enter the contest. There is a better way.

I have not filled out the complete six rounds of a bracket, in advance, for seven years. Growing up, I never filled the whole thing in. Two years ago, in this space, I put forward my reasoning why you shouldn't enter your office pool. I never fully understood why secretaties and cubicle dwellers and sportz junkies are so adamant about proving their ability to see the future, especially when most of them haven't seen enough of the past-in-context to have any sort of real perspective. And Bracket Whining Syndrome (BWS) is a national March menace, the disorder that causes people to say things like "Awwww man, my bracket got busted by [fill in the 11 seed]." (Side effects include bystanders experiencing strong urges to kick BWS sufferers in the Pants Region.)

I've always believed that March Madness is more fun, and more mad, when the games are simply enjoyed for what they are -- individual pieces of America's most spectacular and dramatic sporting event. Putting myself in the middle of things, selfishly rooting for teams because a win would give me a certain number of pool points, detracted from that experience. And in the early days before The Mid-Majority, I ran into a rare fellow with whom I found bracket simpatico.

INDIANAPOLIS -- We pause to repect the accomplishments of Utah State, Richmond and Xavier. Heck, even Gonzaga. And even though we don't draw the line between power conferences and "none of the above" the same way as the people on TV, there were some other schools that don't play in the Premier League of American-Style Collegiate Football (PLASCF) that made it past the Selection Committee too. But the fact remains that all of these teams lost their last game.

Here, Hoops Nation, are your champions. A majority of them won the "marathon" of the regular season. Some didn't. But all survived a March test in miniature, a series of one-and-done games where a loss meant long nights of cold sweat, mentally organizing lists of positive accomplishments, and the real possibility of being sent to a March tournament without office pools. But these teams, pictured below, are ready to do life-or-death battle this week, because they recognize the challenge, and have risen to it.

For most of these teams, the happy moments pictured here will be the last of their kind. They will find their dreams shredded by superior teams. For some of them, this is only the beginning. But all of them are champions, and that's the word that's going on the banners in their home gyms. Here they all are, pictured alongside diagrams and maps of the paths they took to arrive in the Tournament, the bridges between their dreams and their NCAA reality.

Happy Selection Sunday, the day when Christmas morning comes at 6 pm.

Bullet Points

• Seven championships were decided on the penultimate day of Championship Fortnight. All hail Vermont, back in the Dance for the first time since 2005 (Season 1) and also for the first time in the Mike Lonergan era. Congratulations to Morgan State; the Bears navigated the always-difficult MEAC tourney to repeat as titlists. We salute UC Santa Barbara, which hadn't won the Big West tourney title since 2002. Sam Houston State, consistently one of the best teams in the Southland, broke through in the tourney for the first time since 2003.
  
• Congrats, as well, to the surprise winners. The Ohio Bobcats completed a stunning run through the MAC tourney as a No. 9 seed, defeating Akron in overtime to claim that school's first Dance card since Season 1. New Mexico State had to knock off the top two seeds to win the WAC, but the Red Aggies completed the task late last night.
  
• And a special hoorah is in order to yesterday's first-time dancers: Arkansas-Pine Bluff of the SWAC, just five years removed from winning a single game out of 27.
  
• And, of course: well done, South Dakota, which won the first-ever Great West championship and will now play in a lesser postseason tournament.
  
• Chaos into order in just 12 days. Two weeks ago, there were 247 teams with NCAA dreams. Now there are 22. A few of the runner-ups will sneak through the Selection Committee's side door, but the champions of Hoops Nation won their bids on the floor, but defeating any and all comers. We salute each and every one of them.
  
• Today at approximately 3:00 p.m. Eastern time, either Richmond or Temple will be the Atlantic One, and Championship Fortnight will be complete.