Greetings fellow planeswalkers and welcome to the 2015 March Madness tournament! This year’s tournament features 31 of the most famous and infamous planeswalkers from across the multiverse facing off in eight different arenas. Our dedicated staff of analysts and reporters are on-hand to bring you all of the exciting action as these powerful beings face off in one of the deadliest, intense, and time-honored competitions known across the ‘verse: basketball. Today we’re proud to bring you our Elite Eight recaps and previews of the Final Four.
March Madness 2015 Schedule
SATURDAY – MARCH 20
Regional Preview
MONDAY – MARCH 23
Regional Recap/Sweet Sixteen Preview
FRIDAY – MARCH 27
Sweet Sixteen Recap/Elite Eight Preview
MONDAY – MARCH 30
Elite Eight Recap/Final Four Preview
FRIDAY – APRIL 3
Final Four Recap/Championship Preview
MONDAY – APRIL 6
Championship Recap
Elite Eight Recaps
Stadium of the Boros Legion – Ravnica
Vraska (Ravnica) vs. Liliana Vess (Innistrad)
Both of these planeswalkers had difficult roads to get to this point, with Vraska defeating Jace Beleren and Domri Rade here on Ravnica, and Liliana defeating Garruk Wildspeaker and Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded back on Innistrad. With confidence on both sides of the court, this one was action packed from the opening tip-off. The first quarter was a rapid back-and-forth with both women aggressively seeking any kind of advantage. Vraska continued to build off of a strong game from the field, and also fed (sometimes literally) off the energy of the hometown crowd. Liliana, on the other hand, relied on her long-range game racking up points from afar.
Halftime came and went with the game tied and both planeswalkers out for blood. Fouls were called left and right and this is where Liliana had a distinct advantage, shooting almost 90% from the line. Vraska began to lose her cool and soon was called for a technical which let Liliana open up a 10-point lead that she never looked back from. Final score 74-60 Liliana Vess. Vraska, however, was given a rousing ovation from the home crowd as she left the court. Liliana ‘walked away before she could be reached for comment.
Temple of Triumph – Theros
Elspeth Tirel (Theros) vs. Ugin (Tarkir)
The Temple of Iroas has seen many gods pass through its gates in the long history of Theros but nothing could prepare the people gathered there for the raw power and majesty of Ugin, the Spirit Dragon of Tarkir. Theros, of course, is home to a small population of dragons, but none were like Ugin. Elspeth, on the other hand, was all too familiar with dragons on the scale of Ugin’s might, having been on Alara when Nicol Bolas manipulated the plane for his personal gain and the people of Theros knew that Elspeth was a monster-slaying hero of legend.
Elspeth came to play with her game-face on and turned up the physical play early on. She gave up a few fouls but she wanted to make sure that Ugin knew she wouldn’t be intimidated. Unfortunately for her, intimidation isn’t Ugin’s style but landing dunk after dunk is. Elspeth fell behind quickly, trying to set a physical tone that Ugin wanted no part of. Quickly down by a half-dozen points she tried to change up her game-plan but the ancient dragon’s defense was superb and the god-slaying hero lost by a final score of 86-62. After the game Ugin complimented his valiant opponent, but she was already being escorted by Athreos back to Erebos’s domain.
Emeria Sky Stadium – Zendikar
Karn (New Phyrexia) vs. Chandra Nalaar (Zendikar)
Chandra Nalaar had rocketed through to the Elite Eight after burning past Ob Nixilis and Nahiri, the Lithomancer. Now she faced her stiffest test in the form of the centuries-old silver golem, Karn. The spark-imbued construct had a difficult journey from New Phyrexia where he had to face his close friend Venser, and then the inter-planar criminal Tezzeret. Still, Karn emerged victorious from his corrupted home-world to come here today, to the floating stadium in Emeria, and go head-to-head with the Firebrand.
Karn started off sluggish, as if something was slowing down his mechanical parts. Chandra, not really an expert on golem anatomy nor really caring, took full advantage of the golem’s immobility and ran up the score early. As the game progressed things seemed to get worse for Karn who was clearly in no position to be playing basketball. He must have brought some illness with him from New Phyrexia. Chandra defeated him easily by a score of 98-20.
Tolarian Academy Gymnasium – Dominaria
Ashiok (Fiora) vs. Nicol Bolas (Dominaria)
Nicol Bolas was the top seed coming into the entire tournament and did not disappoint in his long match against Freyalise. Ashiok was the top seed of their own region, Fiora, and proved they had earned that seed with convincing victories over Dack Fayden and Daretti. Bolas would be the nightmare weaver’s toughest opponent yet. As the game began it seemed that Ashiok was in over their head. The elder dragon legend seemed incapable of missing any shots while Ashiok was only making about half of their’s. By halftime Bolas was up 45-30 and Ashiok had an uphill battle to make a game out of it.
But Ashiok didn’t escape Theros and then crush the competition on Fiora just to get blown out by the meanest dragon in the multiverse. Ashiok came out hard and fast drawing plenty of fouls from the temperamental dragon. No matter how many officials Nicol Bolas threatened to eat, the kept calling him for fouls. Ashiok had soon pulled within 10 points but it was not enough time as Bolas was able to hold onto the lead and propel himself into the Final Four by a score of 88-84.
Final Four Previews
Wow, what a Final Four showdown we have coming for you later this week. Two of the most powerful lady planeswalkers and two of the most powerful dragon planeswalkers in the multiverse have made it this far, just one win away from the championship game. Both matches will be incredibly exciting so we don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves here, but the prospect of an epic Ugin versus Nicol Bolas, a rematch 1,200 years in the making, is just too entrancing to ignore. On the other hand, seeing Liliana Vess and Chandra Nalaar go head to head would also be a battle of epic proportions! You won’t want to miss any of the action!