Villanova walloped Michigan, 79-62, in last night’s NCAA championship game, capping off an intense March Madness season filled with twists and turns.

Zignal Labs took a deep dive into the media coverage and social media conversations surrounding college basketball’s flagship competition. Here’s what we found.

Michigan Fans Kept It Classy

By and large, the post-loss Twitter commentary by Michigan fans was positive, congratulating Villanova on a well-fought game, noting Coach Wright’s hard work, and looking to the future (a “there’s always next season” flavor).

Sister Jean Steals All The Scenes

You’d expect Michigan and Villanova to be in the top two most popular teams for social media mentions. But fans thrilled to the endearing nonagenarian and Loyola team chaplain Sister Jean, who inspired adoring media coverage, more than 340K mentions, and all kinds of memes. The combination of Loyola’s improbable run to the Final Four, capped off by Sister Jean’s sweetly colorful character, earned the university the distinction of being the most talked about team, above any other in the tourney.

Check out the pre-championship comparison between Loyola and Villanova below.

Coaches Attract Some Big Feelings

Some fans had all the negative feels toward Arizona coach Sean Miller after the team’s flameout in the first (!) round of the tournament. Social media turned its snark level up all the way, linking the FBI investigation into the program with Miller’s loss (“Awkward. The Arizona mascot just reached its arm out to fist bump me. I thought it was trying to hand me cash to play for Sean Miller,” said one caustic commenter). But as much as Miller got some burns, another first-round defeat really set the fans off: UCLA’s loss to St. Bonaventure sparked a briefly trending hashtag – #FireAlford – from disappointed Bruins.

But fans showed the love too. Right before the final, Coach Jay Wright got lots of praise for turning Villanova into a bonafide powerhouse team. Similarly, fans gave Michigan’s coach John Beilein credit for program-building, noting that the championship appearance is the outcome of this excellent work.

Virginia Makes Some (Sad) History

The second most discussed team, Virginia reaped this particular laurel the hard way: by being the first number-one seed to lose to a 16-seed in history. Not how they wanted to exit the big dance, certainly, and that was reflected in the sympathetic social media reaction. The clapping hands emoji was the second most used for the team, linked to tweets lauding Coach Bennett – also the AP’s pick for Men’s Coach of the Year – for his exceptionally gracious post-game speech. Just this week, he was named the 2018 Werner Ladder Naismith Coach of the Year.

What’d you think of March Madness this year?