Did you see those commercials during March Madness, with Ernie Johnson and Guy Fieri? At the same time the NCAA tournament started, the Tournament of Champions started on Food Network. Hell yeah, we filled out those brackets too. We watch all kinds of stuff on the Food Network; my son loves it. Beat Bobby Flay, Chopped, Diners, Drive Ins, and Dives, Guy’s Grocery Games; we know a lot of the “celebrity chefs” that are on these shows. 32 of them would do battle in the Tournament of Champions IV, which concluded on Sunday.
The last 3 TOC titles were all won by women. Brooke Williamson, Maneet Chauhan, and Tiffani Faison were the winners respectively. Would this year bring a guy finally? Well, that is who my son and wife picked to win it all. Jet Tila was one of the #1 seeds, the one they picked to take home the title. He DID make it to the Final Four. I went with one of my favorites, Antonia Lofaso. She was also a #1 seed, however, she didn’t even make it out of the first round. I fell off the couch when she was eliminated; I was screwed. One of the other #1 seeds, Tiffani Faison, the defending champion, was also knocked out first round. As the tournament progressed, it was more and more like the NCAA tournament that these brackets were modeled after; plenty of upsets along the way.
When the dust settled, it was #1 seed Jet Tila vs #3 seed Mei Lin on the West side of the bracket, while #8 seed Britt Rescigno faced off against #2 seed, and the winner of TOC 2, Maneet Chauhan. The first champion of TOC, Brooke Williamson, did not participate in this one. In the first semifinal, Mei took down Jet, and the possibility of a guy winning was gone; Jet did really well, but Mei Lin was on a roll. Maneet dispatched of Britt, finally, after her miraculous run through the tourney; would Maneet become the first two time champ in TOC history?
The final matchup was really good. Maneet is super impressive; she is a master at her craft, and brought it every single round, including the finals. However, Mei Lin was on a mission. We didn’t really know too much about her before this tourney, but man, was she on fire. She was focused, and edged Maneet to win TOC IV. Whew!
It was fun, picking our winners, following along, rooting for our chefs, watching the best in the world compete and do some crazy stuff in the kitchen. We all agreed we would devour most of the food they were serving. Now what? NCAA brackets over, TOC brackets done… will we be picking the winners of each NBA series? How about the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs? Those two postseasons are what’s next…
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