Day 1 Look Back: Hard to imagine a better opening

NEW YORK -- I'm not a historian.

Let me say that up front.

But if you can remember a better opening day of the NCAA tournament than the opening day we just experienced, man, I'd like to hear it.

We had great individual performances, buzzer-beaters, overtime games and double-overtime games. Bad teams won and good teams lost, and Kentucky and Kansas both took their first steps toward an anticipated showdown on the first Monday in April.

Texas did not.

More on that later.

Let's do the Day 1 Look Back ...

Best game from Thursday: Any game that gives us two overtimes and a new Face of the NCAA tournament deserves top billing. So the Look Back starts with BYU's 99-92 victory against Florida that launched Jimmer Fredette into living rooms from coast to coast, just as Gregg Doyel predicted. Fredette finished with 37 points, 29 of which came after halftime. He was both brilliant and a blast to watch, and I'm pretty sure he set a record for most drives to the lane finished with left-handed finger-rolls.

Worst game from Thursday: Kentucky has at least four and maybe five or six future NBA players, which is at least four and maybe five or six more than East Tennessee State. That's the recipe for a blowout. So nobody should be surprised by the Wildcats' 100-71 dismantling of the Buccaneers, or by what they'll probably do Saturday to the Demon Deacons.

By making Pistol Pete shots like this, Jimmer Fredette gets BYU past Florida and becomes a player to watch on Saturday. (Getty Images)

Win to brag about: Murray State entered the NCAA tournament with 30 wins, but the Racers' best victim was, I don't know, Morehead State? The point is that Murray State beat a lot of people and nobody all at the same time. But you're bracket is shot if you focused more on the latter than the former, because the Racers got a buzzer-beater from Danero Thomas and recorded a 66-65 victory against Vanderbilt, otherwise known as the SEC's best team not coached by John Calipari.

Loss to hide from: Georgetown lost to the MAC's ninth-place team. By 14 points. While making Armon Bassett look like Fredette (not literally, of course). Yes, I know the Hoyas lost 10 games in the regular season, including games to Rutgers and South Florida. But losing 97-83 to Ohio is still unacceptable, and without a doubt the biggest surprise of opening day.

Player who deserves improper benefits: Neither foul trouble nor Richmond (or a below-average vertical leap) could slow Omar Samhan, the Saint Mary's big/wide man who got 29 points and 12 rebounds in the Gaels' 80-71 victory against the Spiders. And did I mention the foul trouble? Samhan got all that work done in only 28 minutes. That's 29 points in 28 minutes. If my math is correct, that's awesome.

Player who does not deserve improper benefits: Luke Harangody's career was filled with insane numbers -- proof being how he averaged 23.3 points and 11.8 rebounds last season, and scored double figures in his first 25 games this season. Then Harangody got hurt, Notre Dame was better in his absence, and his role was altered when he returned. To Mike Brey's credit, it worked; Notre Dame was better without everything running through Harangody. But it was still tough to watch Harangody's career close with a four-point effort in a 51-50 loss to Old Dominion, still tough to watch a former double-double guarantee miss seven of the final nine shots he took in college.

Why I'm smarter than you think: I wrote a column back in the preseason explaining how Butler had a schedule that could earn it a good seed and position it to advance deep into the NCAA tournament. And now look! The Bulldogs -- seeded fifth in the West Regional -- hit 13 3-pointers, pulled away in the second half and cruised to a 77-59 victory against UTEP, meaning the Bulldogs are just a win over Murray State away from the Sweet 16.

Why I'm dumber than I think: I picked UTEP to beat Butler.

Three things you should know before you go

1. Villanova has been called the "weakest two seed" ever since the selection committee gave it a two seed Sunday night, and the Wildcats lived down to their nickname against Robert Morris. Scottie Reynolds was mostly terrible, Corey Fisher was 100 percent terrible. Jay Wright's team still won, of course. But it was a 73-70 overtime victory that didn't do much to inspire confidence in anybody except Saint Mary's, i.e., the next school to play Villanova.

2. Kansas State's Jacob Pullen fell hard on his backside during the Wildcats' 82-62 victory against North Texas and had to resort to the locker room for treatment. It looked bad. But Pullen eventually returned to the game, and he's expected to play Saturday against BYU.

3. Murray State wasn't the only team to win late. Ali Farokhmanesh sank a long 3-pointer in the final seconds to give Northern Iowa a 69-66 win over UNLV, Quincy Pondexter made a leaner in the final seconds to give Washington a 80-78 win over Marquette, and Ishmael Smith buried a jumper in the final seconds to give Wake Forest an 81-80 overtime win that ended Texas' season, which brings me to ...

Final thought: Back in November, I said three teams could win it all: Kansas, Kentucky and Texas.

I'd like to take this opportunity to apologize for lumping the Longhorns in that group.

We now know they didn't belong.

But I saw their roster and their depth, and I loved Damion James and Avery Bradley, and I just knew this team was talented enough to be special. Then they beat Pittsburgh and Michigan State, moved to No. 1 in the AP poll, and everything was going perfectly until it stopped going perfectly.

The Longhorns lost 10 of their final 17 games.

They showed no promise in the final two months.

So while I realize UCLA, North Carolina and even Oklahoma were technically bigger disappointments, Texas is the team that most disappointed me. I never had Ben Howland, Roy Williams or Jeff Capel winning the national championship, but I thought Rick Barnes just might. Instead, his team flopped, fell apart and never flipped the switch back on, and now the Longhorns are done in mid-March having never sniffed early April.