The Big Madness of the March Dance

We come to you this week from Cleveland, Ohio, one site of the NCAA basketball tournament's first round. That's right. The NCAA tournament. Not March Madness. Not the Big Dance. Just the NCAA basketball tournament.

TV sportscasters (I am one) and newspaper writers (I might become one when my hair falls out) who can speak or write sentences using those hackneyed phrases are the same ones who will tell you that you gotta love the Big Madness of the March Dance because, of course, "anything can happen!"

I'm sure it can but I bet in most of the games they end up playing basketball.

It's that time of the year that CBS hypes the hopes of the South Carolina States of the world while secretly hoping that they lose just like they're supposed to.

Oh, sure, it's great to see a Gonzaga come out of nowhere (Spokane, Washington, actually) to win a couple of games. See? Look! Anything can happen! Please watch these horrible early round mismatches again next year!

But if too many Valparaisos win too many games suddenly you're left with a tournament in which there are too many Davids and not enough Goliaths. (Hold on, Cindarella reference coming right up.) If we were willing to watch two Cindarellas fight for the glass slipper (Whew! I knew I had to work that in somehow), we'd be happier watching the soap operas that CBS pre-empts to show the first round games.

Pepperdine and Hofstra playing for a berth in the Sweet 16 (a term trademarked by the Kentucky High School Athletic Association, by the way) is one thing. Hofstra playing Butler for one of the Final Four spots would horrify CBS.

Why? Well, if all these bit players to steal starring roles, that means no Duke or no Temple left for people to follow. Certainly the NCAA tournament derives some appeal from the drama and emotion of the games but there's only so far spirit can take you if you don't have stars.

But we can all relax. This March madness usually turns out to be pretty orderly. We have enough upsets to hold our attention through the first couple of rounds but not so many that we lose our interest in the later ones.

Indeed, anything can happen. But as long as they play basketball the big madness of the March dance will come from the guy who took Ball State to meet Creighton for the right to play the St. Bonaventure/Valparaiso winner for a spot in the Final Four.

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