the march sadness 1990s edition bracket

The 2026 Bracket is DUE 2/28/26

Here is the tournament bracket as a fillable Google Sheet (if you use the Google Sheet, you must make a copy before filling it out). You can also download it as a fillable pdf (thanks, Chris Keller!) or an Excel file. Fill out your bracket (all you have to do is make your predictions for the winner of each game using whatever criteria you want), name the file with your last name first, and email it to marchxness@thediagram.com no later than midnight 2/28/26.

If you’re new to the tournament, the way it works is that we do a lottery each summer for spots in the following year’s tournament. From that lottery 64 writers are selected. Each writer chooses an eligible song (typically starting with a longlist that the Committee provides) and writes an essay about that song. The 64 songs the writers select are the songs in the tournament. Writers may select a song from the longlist (which we offer as a starting point) or pitch another eligible song.

This year’s tournament is March Sadness, 90s Edition, so songs must have been initially commercially released in the 1990s. We do not repeat songs from previous tournaments, and previous winners are ineligible. Sadness is in the eye of the beholder, so your mileage may vary as to how sad these songs appear to you to be. The essays are here to illuminate these questions for you.

Our tournament is primarily about American music, and our playlist reflects that, though plenty of songs that were big in the UK or other countries may also factor here, as the writers see fit.

bracket Methodology

The bracket and seeding is determined roughly based on chart positions, commercial success, and other measures of popularity, NOT perceived quality. So a 1 seed is a song everyone knows. A 16 seed is typically far more obscure.