Dan Johnson has been an editor, writer, and analyst for DraftKings and DraftKings Network since 2024. He’s previously held editorial posts at The Paris Review, Macmillan Publishers, Bedford/St. Martin’s Press, ASSIGNMENT Magazine, and FantasySixPack. You can find his various editorial work & writing (sports-related and non-) at all of the above.
Selection Sunday always creates its own bustling black market of hope. And that’s the whole point. Before the first tip, before the first panicked timeout, before some 12-seed guard starts playing like he has been waiting his whole life to ruin a power conference’s afternoon, the bracket becomes a machine for manufacturing premature folklore. Fans […]
March 16, 2026
The 2026 Best Picture race ended felt as razor-thin as so many other competitive contests in the calendar month of March. This was a field crowded with wildly different kinds of ambition: Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle after Another brought big-canvas political spectacle, Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein turned gothic grief into prestige craft, Joachim Trier’s […]
March 15, 2026
What an absolutely glimmering field of writing we had this year. Robert Kaplow’s chamber-piece self-immolation in Blue Moon; Jafar Panahi’s moral-pressure cooker It Was Just an Accident; Ronald Bronstein and Josh Safdie’s feral ambition machine Marty Supreme; Joachim Trier and Eskil Vogt’s exquisitely bruised family drama Sentimental Value; and Ryan Coogler’s mythmaking, genre-splicing Sinners. All […]
March 15, 2026
Selection Sunday always sells itself as a clean act of revelation, as if the bracket is merely uncovering what the season already settled months ago. In reality, it is half coronation, half erasure. The official 2026 field is here, with Duke, Arizona, Michigan, and Florida on the one-line, but the loudest men’s-bracket arguments immediately shifted […]
March 15, 2026
The undefeated Miami (OH) Redhawks are officially dancing, and it all begins with a First Four matchup against the also-eleven-seeded SMU Mustangs. Miami (OH) vs. SMU opening odds The 7–10 line always has the potential to tilt a bracket, and this matchup carries that exact energy. Santa Clara arrives at 26-8 after one of the […]
March 15, 2026
The Kentucky Wildcats landed a seven seed in the South Region of the bracket, and they’ll face off against the 10-seed Santa Clara Broncos. Kentucky vs. Santa Clara opening odds The 7–10 line always has the potential to tilt a bracket, and this matchup carries that exact energy. Santa Clara arrives at 26-8 after one […]
March 15, 2026
The Virginia Cavaliers landed a three seed in the East Region of the bracket, and they’ll face off against the 12-seed Akron Zips. Virginia vs. Wright State opening odds Wright State arrives as the Horizon League champion at 22-11, carrying a style that rarely hides what it wants. The Raiders play quickly, score 80.6 points […]
March 15, 2026
The Texas Tech Red Radiers landed a five seed in the South Region of the bracket, and they’ll face off against the 12-seed Akron Zips. Texas Tech vs. Akron opening odds This is the kind of 5–12 game the bracket lives on: a high-major with real second-weekend ambitions, and a mid-major champion that has spent […]
March 15, 2026
The Purdue Boilermakers landed a two seed in the South Region of the bracket, and they’ll face off against the 15-seed Queens NC Royals. Purdue vs. Queens NC opening odds Queens earned its way here the hard way, winning the Atlantic Sun tournament to secure the program’s first NCAA berth since completing the Division I […]
March 15, 2026
The Gonzaga Bulldogs landed a three seed in the South Region of the bracket, and they’ll face off against the 14-seed Kennesaw State Owls. Gonzaga vs. Kennesaw State opening odds No. 14 Kennesaw State gets here as the Conference USA tournament champion, and the path mattered: the Owls came in as the No. 6 seed, […]
March 15, 2026
The Miami (FL) Hurricanes landed a seven seed in the South Region of the bracket, and they’ll face off against the ten-seed Missouri Tigers. Miami (FL) vs. Missouri opening odds The 7–10 line always carries a little unpredictability, and this one lands squarely in that category. Missouri enters the tournament at 20-12, earning a No. […]
March 15, 2026