It's all come down to this: Green Day and Paramore will meet for the 2011 Musical March Madness title, advancing to the championship game after knocking off a pair of tough challengers in the Final Four.
Third-seeded Green Day held off a late charge from upset-minded #9 Disturbed, watching a big lead (nearly 8,000 votes) dwindle down to triple digits as Final Four polls closed Sunday at midnight. In a contest that saw more than 230,000 votes cast, Green Day's final margin of victory was less than 800.
Things weren't nearly as close in our other Final Four matchup, as #5 Paramore dominated heavily favored #3 My Chemical Romance. Hayley Williams and Co. led from nearly the opening tip, and ran away from MCR — who lost the 2010 MMM championship matchup to Coheed and Cambria — late, ultimately cruising to a 20,000-vote win.
That sets up our 2011 championship game, which is not only a clash of two battle-tested bands (Green Day knocked off the likes of U2, Blink-182 and Panic! at the Disco in this year's tourney, while Paramore survived showdowns against foes like No Doubt and Tokio Hotel), but also serves as the culmination of a year-long quest for revenge: Both Green Day and Paramore were upset in the opening round of last year's MMM and have spent the past 12 months seething about that fact.
In short, this one's been a long time coming. So, why wait to get the action under way?
Polls will remain open until Monday (April 4) at midnight ET. And since it's the championship game, we want to keep things suspenseful, which means results — and our 2011 MMM champion — won't be revealed until Tuesday on MTVNews.com.