Monday, March 16, 2009

Who Do You Like in the NCAA Tournament?

Who do you like in the NCAA tournament? Those words will be spoken zillions of times in the next two weeks. Office pools and all sorts of sponsored or in formal contests will be taking place all over the country. In today’s college basketball in which parity rules, it’s virtually impossible to correctly fill out all the brackets, although last year there was the rare occurrence when all four number one seeds made it to the final four.
I suppose it can be said that the NCAA’s men’s basketball tournament is second only to the NFL play-offs, cumulating in the unofficial holiday status of the Super Bowl when it comes to capturing the country’s imagination, which consistently translates into big network television ratings.
Looking back forty years, except in regional pockets, college basketball trailed college football in popularity by a large margin.
A turning point was the broadcast of a game between the semi-invincible Lew Alcinder led UCLA team and a Houston team led by Elvin Hayes. In a very well played game, Hayes went on a scoring tear that resulted in a rare loss for UCLA.
That game was broadcast late out of prime time. Eight years later when a Bobby Knight coached Indiana squad became the last team to go undefeated through an entire season, the championship game was broadcast on a Saturday afternoon as a pick up from a non-major network distributor called TVS.
Another big turning point was the 1979 showdown in the championship game between Michigan State and the new to the big time Indiana State. Michigan State was led by Ervin “Magic” Johnson, the uniquely talented six foot nine point guard that had a ‘smiling assassin’ demeanor. Cinderella Indiana State was led by Larry Bird, a sharp shooting country boy who became a hero to many white kids who had serious hoop dreams.
The fact that Johnson’s Spartans won the game wasn’t as important as it was the beginning of many legendary battles that rekindled interest in the NBA. Other players like Michael Jordan and Pat Ewing became long time NBA superstars after winning NCAA titles.
Of course, college basketball has always been a defacto minor league and feeder system for the NBA. The growth of the NCAA tournament the last thirty years makes the system seem all the more perverse. The TV networks pay billions of dollars for the rights to broadcast the games and charge billions of dollars to advertisers. The top coaches can command multi-million dollar contracts. They even get basketball shoe deals. But who gets left out of the big money bonanza? Just the players the fans come out, or tune in to see.
In my fantasy world, big time division one football and basketball would be a separate entity away from the rest of the NCAA. The new class could be what it really is, a big time big money minor league systems for the NBA and NFL. The teams could maintain their conference and school affiliations. There would just be a salary structure involved along with the scholarship.
The chances of this happening any time soon are nil unless some type of major movement presses a change.
So who do you like in the NCAA tournament? Give me your choices and the reasons why if you wish.

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