While the threat of Coronavirus is making people work from home and has seen sporting events all over the world cancelled or postponed, two friends from Doylestown have done their best to save March Madness through the magic of video games.
Without the annual March Madness College Basketball Tournament, two friends-- Josh Safran and Jackson Weimer, both graduates of Central Bucks High School West-- found a void in their lives. With an Xbox, a healthy dose of competition and a little bit of social distancing, the pair worked to fill that void with the 'Corona Madness' Video Game Basketball Tournament.
PBS39 News Reports
CORONA MADNESS
Recent Central Bucks West graduates created their own version of March Madness.
"This is the kind of thing we've been doing since we were kids and there was nothing to do. That's what it came down to," said nineteen-year-old Josh Safran. "You know, there's nothing going on, no sports to watch, so I said, 'let's make this happen.'"
To make the tournament as accurate as possible, the pair based their tournament in a ten-year-old NCAA Basketball game.
"They haven't made a college basketball game since 2010, because they don't have the rights to all the players, and it's just so bad compared to modern games," said Safran. "I started going crazy because it got un-fun kind of fast, it's just so old. The hardest part was putting the players in ourselves."
With the help of Weimer's employer, the website eBaum's World, they set up an ESPN-style studio and even used friends as analysts and reporters. They also set up the tournament as officially as they could.
"I was the selection committee and I selected teams and we recorded videos, and then put the players names in and all their ratings," said Safan. "We found a website with their statistics. So, if they were shooing 70% from the three point line, thats good, so I set them at a seven for shooting in the game, stuff like that."
Calling it the 'Corona Madness' Tournament, they played all 67 games and presented them live on the internet. They were surprised how quickly they gained a following.
"We were surprised by the upsets, so, NC State upset Illinois. One of their players saw that and reached out to us," said Safran. "That was awesome. Then their assistant coach followed us. Then, Bradley University beat Villanova in an upset and all these people at Bradley University were sharing highlights online and one woman sent us a video of her son jumping up and down after watching us shoot a buzzer beater."
"That was really cool because when you watch sports, everyone wants to jump up and down," shared Weimer. "Seeing someone do that for something we did, it was like, awesome. Sort of surreal."
In the end, Virgina won the tournament and the pair said they they had fun with the event, but hope no one thinks they don't take the virus seriously.
"Some people might think we are making fun of this coronavirus situation, but it's just the opposite," said Weimer. "We we did our selection Sunday video, we even had my dad, who is a former epidemiologist, come in and talk about the dangers and give tips about washing your hands. So, people said we are making fun of it, but it's the opposite. We are staying, 'stay safe and stay inside and play video games.'"
With no end in sight to the pandemic, the friends said that they've found video games as a great way to stay busy and stay in touch with friends until they can be together again.
"I think we can all agree how hard it is, but for me, I love video games and I'm sorry to say that I'm not sick of them yet. I have a good imagination, so this stuff is great for me," said Safran. "It's keeping me busy and, for now, gaming is the best that we can get."
