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GREENSBORO — Mike Krzyzewski said he doesn't fill out an NCAA bracket, and he's not particularly interested in knowing what anyone else's looks like, either, especially that Obama guy who picked Carolina.

Roy Williams said he'll watch the first game today, then no more.

The coaches of the two ACC schools who begin their journey here today really aren't much fun this time of year anyway, and though they're probably more qualified than the president of the United States to pick winners, at least the president went through the motions.

That's really all anyone does with the NCAA tournament brackets, no matter what they say to the contrary. With the two basketball powers in the same building this week, and with an entire nation of experts swirling around them, the brackets are somewhat superfluous. There are only two questions being asked by those at the Reggie Love level and below:

Can the Heels win this thing with or without Ty Lawson?

And was that really Duke we saw last week in Atlanta?

The answer to the first question is simple: Maybe, maybe not.

The answer to the second is more complex. If the Blue Devils really are as good as they looked in winning the ACC tournament, they'll win this one, too.

The bracket for the 2009 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Championship, which no one knows is the real name for this event, is there for the taking. Somehow, after all the talk of Big East and ACC dominance, the top seeds don't look all that daunting on a flat piece of paper.

Pitt will see FSU at the top of the Boston bracket, and Villanova looms for Duke in Philadelphia. That's a nice Final Four in and of itself.

Carolina and Illinois will head to Memphis with Oklahoma and Herb Sendek, and what we'd really like to see is too cool to think about yet.

Louisville and Wake Forest will see each other in Indy, along with Kansas and Michigan State, and if that sounds like a weak regional, that's because it is. By the time these four get to Indianapolis, we should have a better idea of just how good the top seed in the country is.

In the western bracket in Glendale, which is either in California or Arizona, the four survivors will end all the talk of Cinderella and the mid-majors. Memphis is not a mid-major. Neither is UConn or Washington or Missouri. Didn't we just say the Indy bracket was weak?

The selection committee did its best to complete the brackets this year with fewer than 65 deserving teams, and it did a nice job of limiting SEC and Big Ten schools without infusing too many undeserving mid-majors. Somebody said the committee made a statement, but let's not get carried away. The best teams on paper today will still be on paper next weekend when the real games begin.

The end will come quickly. Pitt beats FSU, and Duke beats Villanova in Boston. Carolina beats Illinois, and Oklahoma will beat Herb to ruin the dream game.

Louisville takes down Wake, and Kansas beats Michigan State ridding the tournament of the Big Ten. UConn beats Washington, and Memphis beats Mizzou and suddenly this is looking like the president's ballot.

The final eight is where this year's tournament begins. And by the end of next weekend, it will all be over for all the elite teams in America except four:

North Carolina.

Duke.

Kansas.

Memphis.

Again, that's the way we look at basketball here. It's impossible to see it any other way. The mighty Big East has no sway here. This is the one place on earth that considers it a football conference. That's because it's where the ACC goes when it needs football teams.

The four teams standing at the end are the hottest four teams in America. Louisville will lose to Kansas because it spent itself against Wake. UConn will lose to Memphis because deep down we'll take Calipari over Calhoun every dime, er, time. And the rest is history, the one thing we want more than any other except the one after that, which the committee screwed up and scheduled as a semifinal.

Duke will beat Villanova, and Carolina will beat Oklahoma and time will stop in this state.

Now we need to stop right here and point out that this is the way all our brackets look every year, with Duke and Carolina beating everybody until they run into each other. The rest is just filling in blanks and eliminating Big East teams dramatically and trying to impress our girlfriends or something. That's why they take all the money every year by choosing all red teams or something.

Here's the thing we know deep down. Memphis and Kansas are real. Everything else is unreal. Take the Tigers and spare Roy from sticker shock. And take the president over Reggie Love because of Ty Lawson. And just so you don't look like you're copying the president, strike a blow for the little man.

Write in Memphis. Just to make your girlfriend mad.

Contact Ed Hardin at 373-7069 or ed.hardin@news-record.com