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Connecticut’s Governor Has One Of The Best March Madness Brackets In The Country Heading Into The Final Four

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Connecticut governor Ned Lamont

Connecticut Public via Getty Images


Connecticut has a pretty legitimate claim to being the College Basketball Capital of the United States based on how the men’s and women’s teams at its flagship university have fared over the past few decades.  Ned Lamont currently serves as its governor, and he may be able to add “Certified Ball Knower” to his résumé based on the status of the bracket he put together prior to the start of the NCAA Tournament.

Barack Obama is a lifelong basketball fan who celebrated the arrival of March Madness by publicly releasing his bracket every year he was in office. His picking prowess left a bit to be desired when it came to the men’s tournament, as he had an approximately 28% hit rate when it came to Final Four teams during his eight years in the White House and only predicted the eventual champion a single time (UNC in 2009).

The former Commander in Chief has kept that tradition alive since the end of his second term, and this year, he has Arizona winning it all while correctly predicting they’d be joined by Illinois in the Final Four. However, he guessed Iowa State would emerge from the Midwest as opposed to Michigan, and he was also one of the many people who regretted being confident about Duke’s ability to get things done in the East.

The Blue Devils lost to UConn (who Obama had losing to Michigan State in the Sweet Sixteen) in the Elite Eight, and the Huskies will have the chance to win their third national title in the past four years.

You probably won’t be shocked to learn the governor of the state they hail from picked them to win it all, but you may be surprised to see just how good his bracket ended up looking.

Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont put together an NCAA Tournament bracket that’s in the 99th percentile

Prior to the start of March Madness, Ned Lamont, who has served as the governor of Connecticut since  2019, posted the brackets he’d put together for both the men’s and women’s tournament while predictably selecting UConn to win a title in both of them when everything was said and done.

Lamont correctly predicted three of the four remaining teams on the women’s side (he opted for Michigan instead of Texas), and he outdid himself when it came to the men’s by nailing the lineup for the Final Four.

He also deserves some credit for how he fared in the rounds leading up to that point, as these were his percentages (assuming he still gets credit for the wins Texas got after beating an NC State team he thought would oust the Longhorns in the first First Four):

  • First Round: 87.5% (8/8 in the East, 6/8 in the South, 6/8 in the West, 8/8 in the Midwest)
  • Second Round: 81.25%: (3/4 in the East, 2/4 in the South, 4/4 in the West, 4/4 in the Midwest)
  • Sweet Sixteen: 75% (1/2 in the East, 1/2 in the South, 2/2 the West, 2/2 in the Midwest)
  • Elite Eight: 100%

Lamont was one of the many people who did not see Florida getting knocked out at the hands of Iowa, and that was really the only significant misstep aside from his decision to tap Troy to upset a Nebraska squad that made it to the Sweet Sixteen in the first round.

If you use ESPN’s scoring system, he’d be sitting at 1,100 points heading into the Final Four, which is better than 99.99% of the more than 26.6 million entries that were submitted for its bracket challenge this year.

Not too shabby.