March Madness is here. Students and teachers at Camas High School (CHS) have been filling out their brackets for the tournament. The odds of filling out a perfect bracket are roughly 9.2 quintillion, but that does not stop the community from trying to defy the odds.
When asked about filling out a perfect bracket, CHS English teacher Joe Farland thought it was an impossible task, but he still had some advice for people filling out their brackets.
“No one’s ever done it. It’s like the Holy Grail; we joke about how cool it would be to actually do it. I do think you have to throw in some upsets,” Farland said. “I always get a little frustrated with people who put all of the number one favorites and the number twos all the way through, because it almost never happens that way.”
Farland takes March Madness very seriously among staff members. He is the main facilitator of brackets, helping the rest of the CHS staff have fun and compete with each other.
“I run school brackets for fun competition with 50 or so staff members and families,” Farland said. “We send out updates with some good-natured teasing about who’s doing well and who’s not.”
Farland expressed his favorite parts of the tournament and why he loves it so much.
“I love all the different stories that come out about different players, and where they’ve come from, their journeys, and what’s got them to this point,” Farland said. “I also love the numbers, even though I don’t teach math. I love charts, graphs, and statistics. So I love all the numbers that are involved [in] tracking stats, seating, odds, and predictions.”
CHS Sports Medicine teacher Jake Howell also has his own tradition for his classroom.
“My tradition that I’ve been doing for the last couple of years is a class-wide bracket pool for both the men’s and women’s tournaments,” Howell said. “The winner wins themselves a 3-course snack that I buy for them.”
CHS students shared their excitement for the tournament by participating in each of their own unique traditions.
“I normally make a bracket with some of my friends,” CHS sophomore Cason Thompson said. “We usually put 20 bucks on it, and the winner gets all the money.”
“My dad makes a pool full of people, we just put money on it, and the winner gets the pass,” CHS sophomore Mason Harrell said.
“I go to my friend’s house, I watch the games with my friends, and I bet money on the teams,” CHS sophomore Landoln Hakala said.
When March comes around, the CHS community loves to get involved with the thrill of making a bracket.
“I see that a lot of brackets come out, usually at our lunch table,” Thompson said. “Everyone I know has a bracket.”
“I definitely notice a lot more of my students than I would expect are paying attention to the basketball tournament,” Howell said. “In my opinion, it’s one of the best sporting events that humans have ever come up with.”
