NCAA's March Madness kicks off with 'First Four' games

NCAA First Four game. — (Image credit: Joe Robbins/Getty Images)

The NCAA men's basketball tournament got started Wednesday night, with the "First Four" games to set the full field of 64 teams when March Madness kicks off in earnest on Thursday. Arizona State beat St. John's, 74-64, bouncing back from a late-season slide. The Sun Devils, a No. 11 seed, move on to face Buffalo, seeded 6 in their bracket, in the round of 64. The North Dakota State Bison beat the North Carolina Central Eagles, 78-74. The Bisons' junior guard Tyson Ward led all scorers with 23 points. North Dakota moves on to face the top-ranked Duke Blue Devils next, on Friday.

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.