Channel Madness Round 2 Results: Late Lead Changes Put Martorano, Schijns Into The Enterprise 8

The polls are closed, and Round 2 of the 2017 CRN Channel Madness Tournament of Chiefs is now in the books. Many of our chiefs left it all on the floor. Here's a look at how the Solutions 16 fared and who's moving on to the quarterfinal round as the Enterprise 8.

In the Hardware region, the hard-fought contest between NetApp's Bill Lipsin and Dell EMC's John Byrne saw a few lead changes and ended as the tightest contest of Round 2. In the end, Byrne pulled this one out, 52 percent to 48 percent.

In the other Hardware region contest, Lenovo's Sammy Kinlaw came out strong and never looked back, besting HP's Stephanie Dismore 79 percent to 21 percent.

In the Cloud region, VMware's Frank Rauch had pulled ahead of Verizon's Janet Schijns, but Schijns came roaring back to take the victory 77 percent to 23 percent.

In the most heavily voted contest of the round, Intermedia's Eric Martorano engineered a dramatic come-from-behind win over AT&T's Brooks McCorcle, taking this one 71 percent to 28 percent.

In Infrastructure, where executives from the same company are facing each other for the first time in Channel Madness history, Hewlett Packard Enterprise's Terry Richardson led all the way through against colleague Scott Dunsire. Richardson won 75 percent to 25 percent.

F5's David Helfer was in control of his matchup with Cisco's Wendy Bahr from the start, closing it out 82 percent to 18 percent.

In the Software region, Oracle's Bill Swales made up some ground against Microsoft's Gavriella Schuster, but in the end, Schuster proved too strong an opponent. She won this one 55 percent to 45 percent.

Also in the Software region, Kendra Krause of Sophos sent Salesforce's Neeracha Taychakhoonavudh to the locker room, winning 62 percent to 38 percent.

So, for the quarterfinals, here's a look at the Enterprise 8 matchups.

F5's Helfer will face off against HPE's Richardson for the Infrastructure crown, while Dell EMC's Byrne and Lenovo's Kinlaw go toe-to-toe for the Hardware title.

Intermedia's Martorano will square off against Verizon's Schijns for the Cloud title, while Microsoft's Schuster takes on Krause of Sophos for the Software crown.

Voting in Round 3 opens today, Tuesday, March 28, at 4:00 PM ET and remains open until Thursday, March 30 at noon ET. Visit CRN.com/madness to cast your votes and choose your chief!