How do we adjust our yearly NCAA March Madness Pool given the new format?

For 14 years, my best friend has run a March Madness bracket pool for friends and family. Everyone knows the deal; we all fill these out at our offices or schools or bars :) A few years ago, they added a Tuesday night “play-in game”. For our pool, we just ignored it.

But starting this year, they’re adding 4 teams into a play-in round, called “The First Four”. It’s two Tuesday night games, feeding into the larger bracket. More importantly, I believe “The First Four” will be the bubble teams, so we’re talking big conference schools who would normally have a 12 seed, but would be excluded as “the last four out”. So this year we’re talking Michigan State or Boston College or some big conference school that’s on the bubble. The play-in game is no longer Northwest Southern Central College vs. Marist (two schools you probably have never heard of, and definitely cannot name a coach or player on the roster).

So we’re struggling with how we should adapt our pool. Is the only way to adjust properly to require everyone to have their sheets in by 6:30pm Tuesday, and this time they have predict the winners of the two play-in games? Or do we continue to ignore its presence, and just let people choose from the main bracket?

What do you think?