Folks, welcome to a special March Madness edition of the digest.  The Terps men survived Davidson and Duke lost on Thursday, so I'm in a good mood (citizens of Terp Nation know what I'm talking about.)  Rest assured that my ensuing celebration did not deter my ability to bring you some of the top news from around the world of mixed martial arts for this week. Here's my Final Four for the week:

East Bracket: Baltimore's own Binky Jones of Ground Control Academy heads up to Atlantic City this Friday, March 16, to face Illinois' Jay Estrada in a Ring of Combat lightweight tournament semi-final match at the Tropicana. Jones was a TUF season 2 alternate and is looking to win this tournament and make a statement in his quest to get to the big show. Fellow middleweight Ground Control fighter Tenyeh Dixon fights New Jersey's own Alexis Aquino in a preliminary bout. I profiled Ground Control, Binky Jones, and co-owner John Rallo in a January article.  Take a read if you are interested in some of the history behind Baltimore's biggest MMA academy.

Southwest Bracket (aka Vegas Bracket): According to NBCSports.com's Mike Chiappetta, UFC 70 -- being held at the M.E.N. Arena in Manchester, England, on April 21 -- will be televised on Spike TV and will be tape-delayed from the event's 2 p.m. EST start to 9 p.m. EST. For a supercard to be televised on basic cable is a big step for UFC. Chiappetta goes on to report in the same article that UFC was hoping to have a deal with HBO ready for UFC 70. However, when that deal could not be completed in time for UFC 70, the promotion opted for Spike TV to televise the event. Here is the UFC 70 fight card currently posted on UFC.com.

Midwest Bracket: Miletich Fighting Systems fighter and former UFC heavyweight champion Tim Sylvia talked to me by phone about a number of topics, though he wouldn't talk specifically about his loss to Randy Couture at UFC 68.  He talked about his back injury, his current frame of mind, and who he wants to fight next if he doesn't get an immediate title rematch.  Click here for the full interview.

West Bracket: The IFL visits the Forum in Los Angeles March 17 for two more matches leading up to the team league's championships. The fight card features 4 teams in competition: Tokyo Sabres (coach: Ken Yasuda) vs. Southern Cal Condors (coach: Marco Ruas) and L.A. Anacondas (coach: Bas Rutten) vs. San Jose Razorclaws (coach: Frank Shamrock).  This ends a busy week for IFL, which launched its IFL Battleground show on MyNetworkTV this past Monday.  While I saw some good points in the show along with things I didn't quite like, the consensus in the online MMA media appears to be that the show needs quite a bit of work.  It will be interesting to see if IFL responds to the criticism and makes changes to the program in the coming weeks.