College students host their own virtual March Madness after COVID-19 shutdown

DOYLESTOWN, Pa. - Usually this time of year the NCAA tournament is underway but due to the coronavirus, it has been canceled. That hasn’t stopped a group of college students from making their own March Madness.

Josh Safron moves his hand quickly over a video game controller as he puts the basketball player’s names into the NCAA video game for his Xbox. College students Ryan Gunsiorowski, Jackson and Louis Weimer, and Josh have been up all night putting the finishing touches on the tournament bracket.

“This is the best time of year for us. The upsets the filling out the bracket it is such a rush to have it taken away…it really feels like something is missing.” Josh said.

So the best friends since elementary school took over their Doylestown back porch and created the Corona Madness.

They wipe down controllers to play in a video game tournament that they will stream online.

Scores will be posted to twitter Jackson Weimer says.  “At the end of the day we are going to have a recap show where we post highlights of each games show what happened in each game. Like March Madness does.”

These games are shown live on Twitch under eBaumsWorld Corona Madness--a video game streaming site and their tournament audience is growing. Jackson says that this is his first time streaming on Twitch and has 5000 viewers already.

They are all home from college after classes were canceled.  These students might not earn college credit but they are still learning.

“The online classes stuff, I put 30 minutes into that, and then 13-14 hours into this. I think all of us agree that we learned more than any online teaching would have given us,” Josh said.

It's time well spent during these tough times.

“Especially during this time, you turn on the TV all you see is bad news, more people getting the coronavirus. Sports is always something that people can get away from real life so.  I just think this is something great we can give people right now.”