Let the Madness Begin!

By Razor Sharp Sports

Well the time is finally here. After 4 months of college basketball games, it is time to get down to the nitty gritty and start the tournament action! Each and every year the discussion comes up about which teams are the #1s, which teams are on the bubble, who is in and who is out, should they add more teams to the NCAA tournament. I am going to take a few minutes to hit some of these topics along with some others that you might not always hear. You may not like everything I have to say, or you may agree whole-heartedly with me. Either way, I encourage you to comment on this article and let everyone know how you feel.

First lets start off with the easy stuff, The #1 seeds and the bubble teams. OK this isn’t that easy, but compared to the other things I am going to hit on, I say it is. The #1 seeds are pretty cut and dry to me as long as all 4 teams run the table the rest of the way! It is Syracuse out of the Big East, Kansas out of the Big-12, Kentucky out of the SEC and Duke out of the ACC. Now this could change if one or more of these teams stumble down the stretch. Tomorrow night we have a big match-up in the Big-12 between Kansas St and Kansas. If the Wildcats can pull the upset there and also win the Big-12 tourney, they could take the Jayhawks #1 seed. Duke still has a match-up this week on the road against ranked Maryland and against rival, North Carolina, plus the always tough ACC Tourney. If they drop one or two in the next two weeks, a Big-10 champion could maybe slip in (Michigan St, Purdue, Ohio St or even Wisconsin). I think that West Virginia or Villanova would need a whole lot of help to get a #1 seed including a regular season loss by Syracuse to either Louisville or St Johns and a heads-up win over the Orange in the conference tournament. Then there are the bubble teams. These things can easily change over the next two weeks with upset winners in conference tournaments and actual performances by each team. Right now the 4 teams I see sneaking in are Virginia Tech (ACC), St Marys (WCC), Miss St (SEC) and Minnesota (Big-10). The last four out are San Diego St (Mt. West), Notre Dame (Big East), and Rhode Island and Dayton form the Atlantic-10. Like I said the next 2 weeks can really change things up there, but it is still fun to talk about now.

Now for a tougher subject, should they add more teams to the NCAA Tournament? Some say that everyone should get in, or go to 128 teams. Some say we are just fine. Myself, I say we need to adjust the field of 64 (or 65) that we have, or shrink it! OK I know that isn’t going to happen, but hear me out. First of all, when is the last time that a #9 – #16 seed has won a National Championship? The answer, NEVER! #8 Villanova in 1985 is the highest seed to ever win the “BIG DANCE”. So why do we put in the extra 32, of course the answer is money. The feeling that NCAA has to give out automatic bids to every small conference in America is also crazy. I am not saying that if some times a team comes along that is special, they shouldn’t be allowed. But do we really have to have a 12-19 Florida A&M get into the tournament. If we want to have 64 or 65 teams, lets take the best 64 or 65 teams. Not the 33 conference winners in Division 1 along with the 32 best teams remaining, especially when most conference champs are decided by a conference tournament, when a team can get hot for one weekend and get in.

Finally, what is with these other post-season tournaments popping up. OK, so the NIT used to mean something, so I will give you that, but now we also have the CBI and College Insiders Tournaments. Are these events making the NCAA and Universities money, they must be or else you know they wouldn’t be around. Is this the same NCAA that says we can’t have a football playoff, because it takes away from the student-athletes class time? So these meaningless post-season tournaments, don’t take the kids out of class. That is a joke.

So how would I have things go? I am going to stick with the field of 64, not 65. Everyone has to win 6 games to win the Championship. There are no automatic bid. You take the best 64 teams regardless of conference size. You rank them and put them in brackets just like you always have. So what about the little guys? That is what the NIT, or any other post-season waste of time, could be used for. If a small school it good enough let them play in the NCAA, if they are good, but not good enough, they can play for a NIT title or something to that effect. Does a 15-15 team out of the Big-10, ACC, SEC or any other major conference really deserve to play in the post season? OK so I know, I may have just been ranting and none of this will ever come into play, but at least it accomplished one thing, I feel better! Make sure you check out all of my March Madness action each and every day at www.FreePlays.com. Just click on Razor Sharp Sports and get a feeel winner daily! Good Luck and enjoy the tourneys!