How easy is filling out an NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament bracket?

It’s so easy that a 2-year-old could do it.

And has.

Amelia Christy of Fenelton, who was 2 a year ago, filled out her own bracket and finished third out of hundreds of entrants in the Butler Eagle’s annual March Madness contest.

“She made her own picks. Obviously, she was guessing,” Amelia’s mother, Angie Christy, said. “We pointed to each game and she pointed to the winner.”

The bracket that the Christy family kept — not the one submitted to the newspaper — was filled out in crayon.

“It seemed only fitting,” said Charles Christy, Amelia’s father.

With men’s team pairings announced Sunday by the NCAA, the Eagle’s contest is under way again. See Pages 9 to 11 for the instructions and bracket.

The Christys have played the contest before, but not with much luck.

“I think I was about second from the bottom last year,” Angie Christy said. “It was terrible.”

Charles Christy said his daughter’s finish last season puts the NCAA Tournament into perspective for him.

“It really is crazy,” he said. “You can put so much thought into it, have all the knowledge you want ... Luck beats knowledge at times.

“That’s what makes the whole thing so exciting. It’s anyone’s guess how the tournament is going to go.”

Robert Gump Montgomery of Saxonburg, last year’s contest winner, admitted he usually loses out to his wife, Gloria, when they fill out the brackets each year.

They have been entering the newspaper contest annually for more than a decade.

“I usually finish in that first column (of the printed results in the Eagle),” Floria Montgomery said. “Last year was just his year.”

Robert Montgomery, 67, is retired and says he has plenty of time to watch college basketball.

“I catch as many games as I can,” he said. “Pitt is my favorite team, but they were a disappointment this year.

“I picked Kentucky to win last year because of (coach) John Calipari. I usually look at the coaches more than the players to figure out who’s likely to carry his team through.

“It sure looks like Kentucky will win it, but there’s other good teams like Wisconsin, Duke ... Luck always plays a factor, too,” he added.

Lily Pearl Schweikert of Butler finished second in last year’s Eagle contest, but she is not the prime basketball fan in her family.

“That would be my husband, Chris,” she said, laughing. “He goes down to his man cave and watches intently. For me, it’s a casual thing.

“We’ve been playing that contest every year since it started. Our two daughters, ages 32 and 30, play it, too.”

Sitting down at the table and filling out their brackets together has become a rite of passage for the couple.

“But we don’t show each other our choices until we’re done,” Schweikert said.

She added that her husband has been partial to Louisville “his whole life, and I don’t know why.”

She’s partial to Pitt, “but they’re pretty bad this year. My daughter went to Penn State. That’s not going to work, either.”

Schweikert admitted she doesn’t have much of an idea or strategy when it comes to filling out her bracket.

“But how many people actually do?” she pondered.