Perfect run ends with Arizona win
Updated: March 21, 2015, 11:19 PM ET
By Darren Rovell | ESPN.com
Breaking Down Kentucky's Win
Fran Fraschilla breaks down Kentucky's 64-51 win over Cincinnati in the third round of the NCAA tournament and analyzes the potential matchup left that could give the Wildcats the most trouble.
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And then there were none.
In the 35th game of the NCAA tournament, the final perfect bracket fell.
A 26-year-old sign language interpreter from Cleveland picked his favorite team -- Ohio State -- to beat Arizona. The Wildcats bested the Buckeyes 73-58 Saturday night.
On Friday night, the man who became the sole ESPN.com entrant with a perfect bracket through the round of 64 was checking his phone from a salsa club, reloading the final scoreboards to make sure he still had every game correct.
By day's end, Malachi, who asked to keep his last name anonymous out of privacy concerns, hadthe only one out of 11.57 million brackets with every team still in green.
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Jamie Squire/Getty ImagesPicking Kansas to beat Kentucky in the Elite Eight is one regret for Malachi, who had the only perfect bracket out of 11.57 million after the second round.
So what type of basketball savant is this guy? How much research and number crunching did he do?
"Nothing," he said Saturday, after his first two picks of the day, UCLA and Kentucky, advanced. "I actually haven't watched a full game this entire year."
Malachi got much further than anyone got last year, as no entry on any of the major websites survived the round of 64.
He said his brother called him Thursday morning to remind him that he only had 15 minutes to fill out a bracket. He filled out two.
"I knew I had to have some upsets, but I can't really give you specific reasons as to why I chose certain teams over others," he said.
In the Midwest and the East, Malachi chose all the favorites to win, with the exception of Dayton.
In the West and South, he then picked both 14 seeds, Georgia State and UAB, to beat Baylor and Iowa State, respectively. Other upsets included his favorite team, Ohio State, beating VCU, and UCLA beating SMU.
Malachi has a great chance of winning his brother's bracket contest, which he says features only six or seven of his friends, but as he looks at his bracket, he says he is upset about picking Kansas to beat Kentucky in the Elite Eight.
"I didn't realize KU was kind of having a down year and Kentucky was where they were," Malachi said. "If I were to do it over again, I would have Kentucky winning that game."
Malachi also has been ribbed by those looking at the score of the title game in his bracket -- Duke 58, Kansas 0.
"I swear I typed it 58-52," he said. "But it was funny to hear the guys on 'SportsCenter' call me a 'wacko' because of the score."
Those who have achieved success over the years to beat the odds have often been the beneficiary of luck.
In 2006, only four fans out of 3 million brackets entered on ESPN.com had the Final Four perfect.
One of the fans, Russell Pleasant, admitted that he picked George Mason that year because he got the school confused with George Washington.
- ESPN.com's sports business reporter since 2012; previously at ESPN from 2000-06
- Appears on SportsCenter, ESPN Radio, ESPN.com and with ABC News
- Formerly worked as analyst at CNBC
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