The NFL season is over and the draft is still several weeks away. Baseball won't officially get underway until the end of this month. Golf's first big event, The Masters, is still almost a month away. But dedicated sports fans realize that for sheer drama, the next three weeks, starting Tuesday, can't really be beat.
Anyone who has watched more than five minutes of ESPN in the past month or even an occasional local sports report knows all about "The Road to the Final Four" and "March Madness." The NCAA Men's Division I basketball tournament gets underway with four games Tuesday and Wednesday and then 16 games on Thursday, 16 more on Friday, eight on Saturday and eight on Sunday. Naturally, as teams are eliminated in these first rounds, the number of games will diminish next week and the Final Four is set for Saturday, April 2, leading to the championship on Monday, April 4.
Fans know that late Sunday afternoon preceding the start of the tournament is another big time as the teams and first round match-ups are announced. In other years, I was glued to the TV, waiting to see where Iowa, UNI or Iowa State would be playing. Unfortunately, this year Iowa is rebuilding and ISU and UNI fell just short of consideration. But after spending the weekend watching some exciting conference tournament games from around the country, it was still interesting to see where the teams would be playing.
The teams are selected for the tourney by a committee of college sports officials. Nearly half of the 68-team field is determined by winners of conference races. The committee members then sort through tons of statistics of other deserving teams to determine who had the best record, who beat the best opponents and probably who would bring the most fans to the tournament games. All of this info is miraculously boiled down to a tournament field by Sunday afternoon and coaches and athletic directors are notified that they must plan on at least one more road trip.
There are studies that indicate that not much work is done in offices around the country following Sunday's selection show as workers study the NCAA Tourney bracket and try to predict the winners. In past years, I have gone out on a limb and listed my picks in a newspaper column. I'm not going to get into that this time. I will say I hope North Carolina does well, since its big star is Harrison Barnes, Iowa's Mr. Basketball a year ago from Ames. He only had 40 points in the ACC semifinals on Saturday. This year's field could provide more than a few first round surprises.
If your team had a respectable record this season but did not make the NCAA field, there's still hope for more play. Shortly after the selection show, the NIT announced its 32-team field. If that's not enough, I discovered two other postseason basketball tournaments that will start action this week. UNI will host Rider Tuesday night in the first round of the 24-team CIT Tourney. Another 16 teams will play in the CBI Tourney. You can Google these tourneys for more information. If my math is correct, that means 140 college basketball teams will each have at least one more game this year.
For fans of Iowa college teams, tonight should be another big night. The Women's NCAA Tourney field will be announced on ESPN. There's a good chance that Iowa State and Iowa will both qualify as at-large entrants. UNI earned its second straight invitation with a conference tourney domination on Sunday (Way to go, Panthers!).
Back in the good old days, when I was gainfully employed with four weeks of vacation each year, I would block out the first Thursday and Friday of the NCAA Tournament week to stay home. Except for a couple of hours out for local programming and news, it was pure basketball from 11 a.m. to after 10 p.m. The start of the tourney is usually around St. Patrick's Day. I'm not a big fan of Irish beer, but there was usually a corned beef brisket roasting in the oven, with the promise of a good dinner followed by a couple of days of reuben sandwiches to go along with plenty of hoops.
I'm currently on a forced hiatus from full-time employment. But the brisket is in the refrigerator, the recliner is in position and the remote is stocked with fresh batteries. Bring on the hoops!
As a postscript, I have been preparing for this week by reading John Feinstein's great book, "Last Dance." It chronicles the 2005 Final Four, but offers plenty of insight into the history of the tournament and the teams and coaches that played there over the years. It also contains a great foreword by Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski, who is once again taking a strong Duke team to the Dance.
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