The Perfect Tournament?

The latest issue of Sports Illustrated proclaimed this year's NCAA Men's Basketball tournament the "perfect tournament." In many ways, they are right on.
Start with the Butler story. Playing their home games in the same building that filmed the epic upset movie "Hoosiers," the Bulldogs became only the second "mid-major" team to make it to the Final Four this decade. Butler has always been one of the top mid-major programs in the country, sometimes referred to as the "Gonzaga of the Midwest." Well in 2010, the Bulldogs are going to where Gonzaga never could - the Final Four, in their home city.
It's rare that the Final Four has a home team. Illinois had a lot of fans in St. Louis and 2005 and Michigan State was surely the fan favorite last year in Detroit. But Butler, a mid-major, will be playing next weekend a mere six miles from their campus. In the best college basketball town in the country, too. That story alone makes the Final Four intriguing.
But where there is an underdog, their is always a favorite. While Butler may be the ultimate underdog this weekend, Duke, college basketball's ultimate favorite will look for their fourth title this weekend. A Butler-Duke match up would be an epic ending to a great tournament.
Michigan State and West Virginia may have something to say about that. Great stories in their own right. The Spartans are making their sixth Final Four trip in 12 years and West Virginia looks for their first title game appearance since 1959.
But back to what has already happened.
Short of a 16 seed beating a 1, this was the perfect tournament. We saw Villanova struggle against 15 seed Robert Morris before being ousted by the Cinderella St. Mary's Gales. If Butler hadn't made the Final Four, this year's story would be Cornell, an Ivy League team making their first tourney appearance advancing to the Sweet 16. Nothing says Cinderella like an Ivy League team.
The number one overall seed, Kansas, lost to another mid major Northern Iowa. Who would have thought that the three best teams all season, Kansas, Kentucky and Syracuse, would all be gone before the Final Four?
We had great finishes too. Murray State, yes, another Cinderella, beat fourth seeded Vanderbilt with a three-pointer at the buzzer. Two days later, they nearly knocked off Butler. The lead in the Michigan State-Maryland second round game changed hands three times in the final second. Had MSU not made their three-pointer at the buzzer, it very well could have been the Terrapins making their third Final Four trip this weekend.
ESPN front runners questioned how good this torunament would be without the likes of North Carolina, UCONN and Arizona. The answer? The best ever.

My Three Cents

1. Lakers fans have short memories - During the Los Angeles Lakers Christmas Day loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers, fans of the NBA champions were frustrated over a few calls that benefitted Cleveland and specifically star player LeBron James. To show their displeasure, they threw all the foam fingers that were free giveaways that day onto the court. James also said he saw a full water bottle being tossed on to the court. Their clear targets were James and the refs. The idea of L.A. Lakers fans protesting the officiating is laughable. The Lakers have been the benefit of every big call since Magic Johnson was drafted. In Game Six of the 2002 Western Conference Finals, the officials clearly handed the game to the Lakers, keeping them alive in a series they would eventually win against Sacramento. The foul disparity in the fourth quarter of that game was ridiculous and former official Tim Donaghy has said that the NBA fixed that game. Lakers star Kobe Bryant has his own set of rules. No team beneifts from the officials more than L.A. Yet they are the only ones to throw their free giveaways on the court. (Of course, the malice at the Palace was much worse, occurring in Detroit). The lesson here is that Lakers fans are unclassy and uninformed. They are all about looking good on camera and being seen at the game. It's not even the playoffs, why do they care about a regular season game against Cleveland so much? I guess their jealous that the refs may like LeBron more than Kobe now. Don't worry, Lakers fans you will get the calls come playoff time. You will have another championship to celebrate in June. All the hollywood stars will be happy. Hopefully that does not happen, but it will.

2. Will Mayweather back out now? - It looks like the International Fighting Commission (IFC) has said that urine drug tests will be given prior to the March 13 bout between Floyd Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao. This is clearly a win for Pacquiao, who refused to take a blood test within two weeks of the fight. I agreed with him that Mayweather was just looking for a way out. Now it looks like Mayweather will have to play by the rules. It doesn't look good for him either. Pacquiao is in his prime and the best pound for pound fighter in the world. This is the fight everyone has been waiting to see and may be the first one I watch live. For the first time in my life, I am looking forward to watching a fight. It would be great for the sport to return to the prominence it had before the 1990s.

3. Always against the NCAA and their coaches - I was pleased to hear on ESPN that former Arizona State and Nebraska quarterback Sam Keller was suing the NCAA and EA Sports for using his likeness in their video game highlighting college football. One of Keller's hopes is to get each player whose likelness is used by EA $1,000 for each game they are portrayed in. I would love for that to happen. College players deserve to get paid. Period. Football players bring in the most money at a number of Division I schools, but don't see any of it. The coaches and administration gets all of it, even though they don't do any of the work. Why not give the players some rights? I got paid in college to work for the school newspaper and radio station. That is a lot easier than showing up to practice every day and bringing in millions for the school on gameday. I think all college athletes should get paid a small stipend each semester. $1,000 would even be an improvement. That way, there will be less illegal negotiating going on and the player level will be fair. But the NCAA has a lot of problems and is a sham in many ways. No playoff system, coaches that lock their players in small dark rooms because they got a concussion (Mike Leach needs to be fired and banned from coaching football), coaches that get paid millions (Mack Brown), coaches that think they are the star of the show and can do whatever they want (Urban Meyer) and college presidents that see the financial benefit of what the players are doing. The only league I can think of worse than the NCAA? The NAIA.