In March, the sports world is rather quiet. Football has ended, hockey and basketball are in the middle of their seasons, and baseball is just getting started, but one event stands out and makes the month of March much more bearable for sports fans. The NCAA Basketball Tournament, or March Madness as many of us know it, is one of the biggest tournaments in all of sports. Teams from all over the country with all kinds of ability play for the ultimate title of National Champions. Only in March Madness can you get a Mercer team seeded 14th beating a talented Duke squad or an eighth-seeded UCONN team with little hope at the end of the season winning it all. The Cinderella stories and the nail-biting games are what makes it "March Madness." And for four weeks, millions gather around their TVs to see if they have predicted the correct winner and win their office bracket pools. So with that said, here are some of my predictions for this year's tournament.

Cinderella Story: Gonzaga

Now, this may not seem like a Cinderella story to many of the people reading this article, but you have to look at Gonzaga's season as a whole. This is a team that lost key players early in the season and has been forced to work with a very short bench for the majority of the season. They have had a few rough losses and have only beaten UCONN and Saint Mary's when it comes to the RPI Top 50, both teams that may not even make the tournament. Their strength of schedule was 126 and they have squeaked by against some lesser teams. Also, they needed to win their tournament or they would not be in the tournament. I think they can make a big run because they are very versatile when it comes to their bigs. Sabonis and Wiltjer are big men with range and they really help stretch the floor. If Gonzaga gets put in a weak bracket, look for them to make a run.

Sleeper Team: Seton Hall

The team has talent and they are young. Seton Hall just won the Big East Tourney for the first time in 23 years and it is in large part due to their exceptional Sophomore Isaiah Whitehead. The Sophomore guard, easily Big East Player of the Year, took control this season and dominated the Big East. He led the team through Creighton, Xavier, and Villanova, the last two being top five in the country, and has the team playing with swagger. Along with the many other talented youngsters on the team, Seton Hall has consistently scored and played exceptional defense, suffocating teams with a mix of zone, man, and press. The team has won 8 of its last nine games losing only to Butler on the road. The thing that will hurt this team though is foul shooting and turnovers. Being a 67 percent free throw shooting team is not good at all and is has shown as a huge Achilles heel last in the Big East Tourney. Turnovers have also proved to be a weak spot for the Pirates, especially when being pressed late in games. The team has trouble finishing, but luckily they build themselves a big enough lead to overcome that. If Seton Hall can figure out the turnovers, at the least and finish games strong, they will be a very big threat in the tourney.

Final Four Teams: UNC, Kansas, Oregon, and West Virgina

I think the first two are easy right now because of the way they have been playing recently. UNC and Kansas have both been playing very good basketball and dominated their respective conference tournaments. It seems that both have finally found themselves as teams towards the end of the season and look for big runs, as per usual for both teams, in the tournament. Now, to the more complicated predictions. In my opinion, after Kansas and UNC, no team has played well enough for me to consider them almost a lock for the final four. A team that has come close though is Oregon. Oregon has played an unbelievably tough schedule in and out of conference. They have an RPI and Strength of Schedule of 2 and have won a surprisingly difficult Pac-12 Conference championship, making it look easy against Utah in the final. This is a team that in a weak bracket can easily make a run at the Final Four and even the championship game. Then, finally, to the most surprising of them all, West Virginia. Many would say what about Virginia or Michigan State. Those teams have not impressed me as much and everyone knows in the past few years Virgina has been shaky in the tourney. In my opinion, West Virgina is solid. One of the only teams to beat Kansas this season, West Virginia has picked up big wins as the season has gone on and made their way to runner-up in the conference tournament in a very tough Big 12. In a conference that will have six or seven teams in this year's tourney, they do not really pop as much because of their number of losses, but I believe that once they get to play teams out of conference, they can make a big run at a final four spot.

Of course, this is all pending the bracket selection later this evening. With that said, this tournament is set to be a very interesting one based on the season and you could see some things that haven't happened in a while. Here's to hoping my predictions are right and your brackets are perfect.