By John Feinstein
WashPost
Sunday, March 15, 2009
Finally, tonight, shortly after 6 o'clock, the speculation will end. There will be no more questions about who is in or who is out of the NCAA tournament, and the self-declared bracketologists can climb back under their rocks until next winter.
If you believe all the huffing and puffing, this is not going to be a good year for the mid-majors. The reasoning goes something like this: Because so few of the so-called bubble teams from the so-called power conferences have truly distinguished themselves and because there aren't as many no-brainer mid-majors out there, the basketball committee will have no choice but to take all the mediocre bubble teams from the mediocre major conferences.
Sadly, they're probably right.
But should they be? Will the world truly be a better place because the Big Ten, which has one truly quality team (Michigan State) and one other pretty good team (Purdue), gets eight bids as the experts say it will? Shouldn't Illinois and Penn State have been sent immediately to the NIT -- or, worse, the College Basketball Invitational -- the very minute their 38-33 debacle came to a merciful conclusion last month?
(More here.)
No doubt that many people mark their calendar based on when the NCAA tournament will run, but my sports calendar is marked for the St. Paul Saints' ReCount Night. Of course, the final result of the May 23 game will not be official until sometime in mid-June ... which may be before Franken gets seated.
ReplyDelete