By Tyler Vanderelst |Staff Writer|

One of the biggest sporting events in the world has finally concluded in the men’s college basketball tournament March Madness.

This year’s champion was the University of North Carolina as they were able to come back from their buzzer-beater defeat in last year’s championship game.

It was a very sloppy game between the University of North Carolina and the University of Gonzaga that was controlled by the officials who were calling foul after foul giving the players no chance to get into a rhythm.

The Tar Heels were able to pull off the win by making the last minute run to put Gonzaga out of reach. According to NCAA.com, 12.4% of all brackets had UNC winning the whole thing.

According to Bleacher Report, there were over 70 million brackets filled out and there was $10.4 billion bet on this year’s tournament alone.

To put this in perspective only, $4.4 billion was bet on the Super Bowl, which is known as America’s biggest sporting event, according to Forbes.com.

Because so many people fill out the brackets to pick who they think is going to win, it leads to a lot of people watching the tournament.

Brackets are a big reason why many people pay attention to college basketball so they can try and beat their friends by showing them that they know more about the sport than the others.

Student Alexis Plant, who made a bracket for who she thought would win, didn’t end up doing as well as she would have hoped.

“I didn’t know much about basketball so I picked the teams whose mascots would have won and that didn’t work out very well,” said Plant.

Another big reason many people tune in to watch the tournament games are because the small schools that people might have gone to that don’t get too much recognition normally can upset a big school and give them their minute of fame.

The University of Northwestern had their moment of glory by making the school’s first-ever tournament and even made it to the second round.

This was very exciting for those students at Northwestern and their alumni because finally their little school was becoming known and this resonates an exciting feeling for those who have attended this school.

“I like how teams in smaller conferences get the chance to play the big name schools,” said Amin Sahwani.

There is no doubt that America loves their sports but when it comes to March Madness people really do go all out when it comes to making their own predictions and bets.

Next year UNC will try to make it to their third straight national championship game and defend their title from the other 63 teams who will be fighting for the trophy.