If there's one thing about the NCAA Tournament that feels sad, it's that its first weekend is its best. That's all well and good for us on, say, Wednesday; the tension and angst and anxiety make the first weekend of the tournament seem like a holiday all in itself. The problem is that instead of building into a slow crescendo like other playoff systems typically do, the first weekend explodes in ecstasy and then we're left for actual days -- days! -- without college basketball. Suddenly, there aren't 16, or even eight, games in a day anymore. What happened? How could that have gone by so fast? And where'd it all go?

Final Four weekend is incredibly fun, and I can't wait to revel in next weekend's action, too. But I'll miss this beautiful first weekend. Farewell, weekend one. I hardly got drunk enough to fully enjoy you.

Performance of the Day: Stephen Curry. (And, by extension, Stephen Curry's shoes, pictured above.) There were plenty of enjoyable and important performances yesterday, but none so viscerally exciting as Stephen Curry's all-second half showing to lead Davidson over Georgetown. After a beautiful shooting performance in the team's first round win over, Gonzaga, Curry looked like a potential star of the tournament, but it was hard to dissect how much of that was Gonzaga's reeling play and how much was really Curry's ability. (Safe to say, given San Diego's first round performance, that Gonzaga deserves the benefit of the doubt.) Curry looked done in the first half against Georgetown, the victim of whatever John Thompson the 85th does during those Jordan "There Are No Cinderellas" commercials. Turns out, there are Cinderellas. And if Curry is any indication, Cinderella looks too young to drive. Don't make a move on Cinderella. It would be creepy.

By the way, in case you were counting, Curry has 70 points in his first two games of the tournament, 30 of which came against Georgetown's vaunted defense. It's hard to imagine him going off again against Wisconsin, too, but wouldn't we have said the same thing before Georgetown?

Honorable mention(s): Courtney Lee, North Carolina, Bill Raftery, Gus Johnson. Courtney Lee's 29 led Western Kentucky over San Diego, an upset even if the seeds disagree; North Carolina was totally frightening against Arkansas -- Lord knows what they would have done to Indiana; and Bill Raftery and Gus Johnson were on their absolute A games all weekend. It helps that Raftery caught a fantastic matchup late between Tennessee and Butler, and Gus, as usual, shone through. Even Len Elmore can't keep this man down.

Patrick Roy Spawn Brutal Performance of the Day: Oklahoma. This blog's humble authors both assumed Oklahoma would be leaving us early this year, but who knew it would be in such spectacularly ugly fashion? To say the Sooners shot poorly is roughly akin to saying those Coke Zero commercials are annoying; it's true, but it doesn't go nearly as far as it should. 13-47. 5-18 from three. 13-19 from the free throw line, which isn't particularly great but is at least some floating wreckage of respectability in an ocean of incompetence. Just ... ugh. At least put up a fight. (Same goes for you, Arkansas. Is there some sort of lower-midwest-south-state pact to play horribly on Easter? Did something leak across the border?)

Honorable mention: Memphis. It's boring to harp on the same thing over and over again about a team so exciting and fun to watch -- and so intensely effective in so many areas of the game -- but if the Tigers don't learn to manage games better down the stretch, there's no way they get past Michigan State and Texas. The Spartans have unveiled their typical efficient tourney-ready game (downing Pittsburgh in the process), and the Longhorns make too few mistakes. Those games will not be blowouts, and if the Tigers can't rely on themselves at such a crucial part of the game, they don't deserve to go to the Final Four. 

Regrettable Tournament Reality No. 2: Above, I talked about how the quick nature of the first weekend hurts; isn't there any way we can stretch this out another couple of days? Please? There's another bugaboo in my life: Chalk. Taking another look at the bracket reveals but two, maybe three, upset Sweet 16 teams. The rest of the bracket is chalkier than Patrick Ewing's knees. (Zing!) Bor-ing.

Regrettable Tournament Reality No. 3: Butler was no seven-seed. Grrr.

Really, I think that's all for regrettable tournament realities. Everything else is pretty much perfect, right?

Related: The Big Dance