CBS, 7:00 p.m. ET
CBS, 7 & 9:45 p.m. ET; TBS, 7:45 & 10:15 p.m. ET - The opening rounds of this year’s tournament delivered enough upsets to overturn a lot of people’s office bracket pools, with two No. 2 seeds being sent packing by scrappy No. 15 seeds. And tonight, the action begins (at 9 p.m. ET on CBS) with Syracuse, which barely escaped elimination in its game against No. 16 UNC Asheville, facing Wisconsin (at left). The other CBS game in tonight’s Sweet 16 round, at 9:45 p.m. ET, is an all-Ohio smackdown: Cincinnati vs. Ohio State. TBS also has a doubleheader tonight. A 7:45 p.m. ET, it’s Louisville vs. Michigan State, followed at 10:15 ET by my alma mater, the Florida Gators, vs. Marquette.
NBC, 8:00 p.m. ET
French Stewart guest stars in this week’s episode, which is about a sudden obsession with “Celebrity Impressions.” Everyone seems to want to get into the act – and that makes for a lot of bad acting. But only from the TV characters, not the actors playing them.
Fox, 8:00 p.m. ET
After last night’s Billy Joel competition, one of the contestants is being ousted after the latest audience voting round. And if, as Billy Joel has written, “Only the good die young,” even the best of them is at risk of elimination this evening. But remember – there’s one “judges’ save” that can come into play, making the ill-fated contestant a possible recipient of the American Idol equivalent of a reprieve from the governor.
Fox, 9:00 p.m. ET
SERIES RETURN: Long after the series pilot was sneak previewed, this Fox drama returns. Kiefer Sutherland, as Martin, by now knows his mission: To follow the unspoken bidding of his non-speaking son, which this week takes him to the owner of a pawn shop. And this week, the mysteriously connecting plot threads revolve around that pawnbroker, a baseball, an urn of ashes, and a flight attendant. Follow the trail – and see if you like what you find.
NBC, 10:00 p.m. ET
This is an interesting entry in this new series, one that suggests yet another variation on the storytelling techniques employed in its alternate-world scenarios. Tonight, Michael (Jason Isaacs) is investigating a murder at a party, when one of the party guests turns out to be a young woman named Kate (Brianna Brown), who used to babysit Max when he was younger. Later, Michael encounters Kate in his other reality, too – but there, she’s almost unrecognizable, a wasted shadow of her “other” self. Michael questions her different personas, but learns clues about something other than the killing. He learns, for one thing, why it’s important to keep trying to reach his son.