As big of a sports nut as I am, I've never been a big college basketball fan. I was just never that impressed with the quality of play: If lots of missed threes, ugly second-chance baskets, and turnovers are your thing, I felt, then more power to you - but I'll stick with the NBA, thank you very much.
Besides, there's not exactly a collegiate powerhouse in the state of Oregon. Both of my parents graduated from Portland State, and the Vikings aren't exactly the Tar Heels when it comes to having a basketball pedigree. The Oregon State Beavers haven't made the NCAA tournament since 1990, when Gary Payton was running the show, and they got bounced in the first round of the NIT last year by true superpower Cal-State Fullerton. It's hard to get too revved up about that.
And I think Oregon coach Ernie Kent must have some dirt on the athletic director, because the man makes Isiah Thomas look like Red Auerbach. Don't let this year's gaudy 26-7 record fool you; this team is being piloted by a man who hasn't advanced out of the first round of the tournament since 2002, where the deepest he could take a Ducks team with three NBA first-rounders and a second-rounder was the Elite Eight.
Here's a brief recap of Oregon's recent postseason history: 2003 first-round NCAA knockout, 2004 first-round NIT loss, 2005 first-round NIT loss, 2006 no postseason showing. During that 2004-06 stretch, Kent had three McDonald's High School All-Americans on the roster, so it's not like he was playing with schmucks he plucked out of some campus pickup games. What's worse, all that suckiness has caused an exodus of the best prep talent the state of Oregon has ever produced.
At one point Rivals.com had Kevin Love and Kyle Singler, two superb high school players, ranked as the No. 1 and No. 2 prospects in the country, but the U of O was never in the competition for either: Love is going to UCLA and Singler's headed for Coach K's whiner squad. Love's father was a 1994 Ducks Hall of Fame inductee and he still didn't even give them a sniff! I was actually rooting against the Ducks this year so that Kent would finally get axed; now the man has job security for another couple of years. Damn successful season.
But I digress. My point was I just couldn't be roused by college basketball. But then something odd happened: I watched the Louisville-Pitt game about three weeks ago and I found myself captivated. The unranked Cardinals were on the road, facing a tough Pitt squad, and they were just putting the boots to the Panthers. Pitt would make a run, a din in the crowd started to build, and then an anonymous Louisville player would nail a momentum-crushing three or come up with a key loose ball.
You know that Jumpman 23 commercial where High School Jordan steals the ball on the inbounds pass and dunks as time expires to win the game, and everyone in the crowd moans and wails, and a home player rips off his jersey in despair? And H.S.J. just stands there and basks in being the villain? That was Louisville embodied in that game. Pitt was playing frenetically, trying to claw back into it, the crowd was rallying behind it, and it was almost like the Cardinals were saying, "Let's see how many times we can give them false hope and then rip their hearts out."
I loved every second of it. There's nothing like a little schadenfreude to pique my interest. I started reading the recaps, watching the highlights, and following the many draft boards that proliferate all over the Internet, and all of a sudden I found myself able to debate the merits of Al Horford versus Corey Brewer as lottery picks and offer valid reasons for why this year's five seed-12 seed upset is going to be Old Dominion over Butler.
There's just something about college basketball. Perhaps it's that with a few different turns here and there (and a hearty dash of fantasy) I can imagine myself suiting up for a mid-major that's getting ready to be this year's Cinderella story. And it drives me up a wall when people talk about NBA players not playing hard compared to their collegiate counterparts - after all, if the former played 82 games instead of 35, and had to travel all over the country while doing it, they probably wouldn't play all-out every game either - but there's no denying the tremendous effort that collegiate teams put forth. Or maybe it's just the annual anarchy that is March Madness.
Whatever it is, I'm hooked. I have my bracket downloaded, my ESPN Insider cued up, and my little brother on speed-dial for trash-talking purposes. And when I pencil the Ducks into the Final Four ... hey, what's the Big Dance about if not for hope?
