March Madness

Today usually starts my favorite sports weekend of the year - March Madness's Sweet 16.  Winnowed down from 68 teams, the top four from each of four brackets face off for the right to go to the Final Four.   

This year I'm hard pressed to tell you the names of more than one or two teams competing.  I'm not even sure if they are playing on Thursday or not.  For some reason, there were games last Monday, something which was brand new this year.  It must be COVID protocols.  

Whatever the reason, it's confusing.  TBG refused to believe me when I insisted that the announcer said Monday, only to return, abashed, a few hours later with the admission that I was right.  I couldn't take much credit for it, though.  It really shouldn't have been the right answer at all.

Duke and North Carolina are no where to be found.  Once mighty Indiana didn't make the cut, and equally fabulous-in-the-past Georgetown was seeded way at the bottom.  With more and more One and Done players (kids leaving for the NBA after one year of showing off their skills in college) joining those going directly from high school to the pros, there's little incentive beyond laundry or an alumni connection to draw the more casual fan to the game.

You can't watch a player develop into a superstar over four years if he's bailing after just one.  It's hard to evaluate a coach when his roster is so unstable.  The best players aren't in the college game anymore, and if they are, they are not there for long.

I usually have an upbeat post about our family pool.  This year, the grandkids were in the bottom 0.1% of all ESPN participants.  After the first round, I was in the bottom 17%.  None of us are paying much attention to the standings except for Queen T, whose virgin experience with this ought to be more enthusiastically experienced by the rest of the family. 

Just another COVID casualty.