We don't have any blog posts about it, but the company my friend's and I started got into YC with 0 connections and we're pretty much all from the midwest USA.

We don't have any blog posts about it, but the company my friend's and I started got into YC with 0 connections and we're pretty much all from the midwest USA. No one took a risk on us until YC, every penny the company had came from 2 of the cofounders' pockets. While we're not out of the woods yet, there is no way we would still be at it w/o YC.