March

March is one of my favorite months of the year for one reason: college basketball tournaments. I enjoy watching baseball, football, and pro basketball,, but my favorite has to be college basketball. I love the atmosphere surrounding the games and the enthusiasm that pervades the campus during the season. Where else do you find people camping out for days to get tickets to a game? Gametime is special on campus. The homecourt advantage is definitely a factor when the students stand the entire game and the noise rarely ebbs. Sometimes the fans get out of hand, but most of it is in fun.

In March it all goes up a whole other level. The noise and excitement begins on the first day of the conference tournament and continues until a national champion is crowned. The three divisions of the NCAA, the NAIA, junior colleges, and Christian colleges each have their tournaments. The fun is not limited by gender either. Both men and women compete at each level and the excitement is equal.

As the national tournaments begin, office pools are formed, brackets are filled out, and allegiances are proclaimed. In every bracket, someone has tried to foresee where the upsets wil happen. Will a 13 seed beat a 4 seed again this year? Will a 15 defeat a 2? Or will the unbelievable happen and send a number 1 home courtesy of a 16 seed?

Who will be this year's Cinderella? Which team will prove to the critics that it should be there? Which team will prove to be vastly overrated? These questions will all be answered in the coming weeks. My own personal questions are: Will Winthrop win a tournament game again this year, and how far will Xavier go?

Enjoy the tournament. On April 7, one team will finish its season with a loss, and one team will reign as champions. The next day, the sun will come up, and some of us will awaken with this feeling that something is missing.