Dell's Cook, Microsoft's Sorgen Fail To Advance: CRN Channel Madness Round 2 Results

Voting for Round 2 in the CRN Channel Madness Tournament of Chiefs is now closed,and we're about to find out who from the Solutions 16 is moving on the Enterprise Eight.

We started with 32 of the industry's most influential channel chiefs, and now we're down to eight. More than 80,000 votes have been cast in the tournament so far, so let's see who's moving on to Round 3.

In the Infrastructure region F5's Jim Ritchings extended his lead in the final minutes to dismiss Eaton's Herve Tardy 58 percent to 42 percent.

Shannon Sbar of APC by Schneider Electric turned on the heat to close out her match against HP's Sue Barsamian 56 percent to 44 percent.

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In the Hardware region, a nail-biter between Ron Gill of Ruckus and Dell's Cheryl Cook came down to the buzzer. Cook was down by 10 points yesterday and surged in the final minutes but came up just a bit short. Gill takes this one 51 percent to 49 percent by a margin of just 31 votes.

NetApp's Thomas Stanley routed Dell's Frank Vitagliano in Round 1 but could not recreate the magic to get past another channel stalwart here in Round 2. Sophos's Mike Valentine proved too tough to take, beating Stanley 58 percent to 42 percent.

In the Cloud region, VMware's Frank Rauch showed us he's in it to win it, dismissing Axcient's Justin Moore 60 percent to 40 percent. Rauch's contest was the most heavily voted of Round 1, and he repeated that feat again here in Round 2.

Rauch's colleague at VMware, Dave O'Callaghan, could not overtake Verizon's Adam Famularo. Famularo wins 56 percent to 44 percent.

And in the Software region, IBM's Marc Dupaquier showed he's made of tough stuff, sending Microsoft's Phil Sorgen packing 62 percent to 38 percent.

Sorgen's cohort at Microsoft, Jenni Flinders, has a happier tale to tell, defeating Citrix's Tom Flink 57 percent to 43 percent.

So from the Solutions 16 we move on to the Enterprise Eight. Let's look at the match-ups.

In the Infrastructure region, F5's Jim Ritchings will face off with Shannon Sbar of APC by Schneider Electric, while in the Hardware region, Sophos's Mike Valentine takes on Ruckus's Ron Gill.

Battling for the Cloud crown, VMware's Frank Rauch will take on Verizon's Adam Famularo, while in the Software region IBM's Marc Dupaquier goes head-to-head with Microsoft's Jenni Flinders.

Round 3 voting in CRN Channel Madness opens today at 4:00 PM ET and will remain open until Thursday April 2 at noon ET. Visit CRN.com/madness to cast your votes and choose your chiefs.

PUBLISHED MARCH 31, 2015