My Dog Bet on Villanova

It was time to fill out the annual family NCAA Basketball Tournament brackets. The pool is a tradition in our home where the winner gets to decide where we're having the victory dinner.

Since we had a new member of the family - a beautiful cocker spaniel named Otis - it was decided he should be included in the fun.

Sure, it was goofy. It's the old experiment we've seen a hundred times where monkeys pick the winners of horse races or which stocks to purchase. In a lot of those cases, the monkey actually does pretty well. We had the same hope for Otis. He's s a sporting dog, enjoys trying to catch Frisbees, a good game of fetch and playing soccer in the back yard with my daughters. Certainly he could hit half the opening round games, in theory anyway.

Trouble was, we had to find a way for Otis to make his selections. We began by setting two of my business cards in the floor. Each represented one of the two teams in each game. Otis played along for about six picks, then realized there was no food involved with the business cards.

He lost interest.

Food in hand, I placed one pebble on the left of Otis and one on the right. He began making his picks.

For the record, Otis picked Villanova to win the NCAA Tournament, beating Arkansas. As you well know by now, both lost in the opening round. Otis also got hung up on Nevada, picking the seventh-seeded Wolf Pack to knock off Memphis, Louisville and Ohio State. It didn't happen, though Otis seemed more interested in catching the squirrel in the back yard than in his dismal NCAA picks.

He barely even watched a game. I tried to tell him that research was the key to picking NCAA Tournament pools.

After two rounds of the tournament, Otis had just two teams remaining, Oregon and Ohio State.

He was actually 18-14 in the first round, though. That put him in an early hole, but I've got to believe he would have done pretty well against other dogs in our town.

Otis's biggest upset pick, however, was the Belmont Bruins, a 15-seed, to beat Georgetown, a 2-seed. Georgetown won, 80-55.

Sad thing is, Otis is easily beating our five-year-old daughter in the pool. She's really big on McDonald's Happy Meals, so maybe that's a good thing.

Although it wasn't the showing we were all hoping for, he'll get a chance to redeem himself. The Masters is coming up soon.

Otis likes Gary Player.