March, It's the Greatest Time of the Year

March is Here.......

March Madness Baby! With the NCAA Men's basketball season nearing an end and the onset of March here, let the best time of the year begin. You know what that means, its bracket time!

The NCAA tournament is by far the best sporting event in sports. It truly is the only tournament or event where a champion can come out of nowhere because there are so many schools that have a shot. While there has never been a 1 vs. 16 upset seeding yet, there have been four 2 vs. 15 seeding upsets. Most recently in 2001, where little known Hampton beat Jamaal Tinsley (Indiana Pacer's starting point guard) and the Iowa State Cyclones. Being from Wisconsin, I certainly have 2 very vivid memories of years past where schools in the state of Wisconsin have had major runs. In 2005, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Panthers under coach Bruce Pearl (a great coach who I absolutely love and would love to play under now at Tennessee, check out his pic where he sat in the student section at a Lady Vol's game) made a fantastic run to the Sweet-16 with a 12 seeded team. They eventually lost to Illinois, who was a number 1 seed that lost eventually in the championship game to North Carolina and had come off a near undefeated season (one loss in the final game of the year at Ohio State). My other memory is from my alma-mater, Wisconsin. The 2000 Wisconsin Badger basketball team made an improbable run to the Final 4 as an 8 seed. In the process, they knocked off number 1 seeded Arizona, number 4 seeded LSU, and number 6 seeded Purdue before falling to eventual champs and number 1 seeded Michigan State. Coach Dick Bennett had installed an amazing shut down defense for the Badgers and it led them to an amazing cinderella run in the tournament despite the lack of any true offensive threat.


Laettner's Shot Against Kentucky
Bryce Drew's game winner
I love how players step up big at tournament time too. Players can define their entire career because of a tournament run or shot. Names that come to mind are Christian Laettner,Bryce Drew, Miles Simon, Sean May, and Mateen Cleaves. Also, in a more recent trend freshmen in college have begun to dominate the scene. Last year the entire Ohio State roster that made it to the championship was defined by freshman Greg Oden, Mike Conley Jr., and Dequan Cook. Carmelo Anthony has to come to mind when he lead his Syracuse Orangemen to the title as a freshman in 2003. I don't know about you, but I can't wait for this year's March Madness to begin!