The NCAA Tournament: The Madness of Choosing a Winner
Posted on | March 3, 2007 | No Comments
With March Madness just around the corner, it won’t be long until the NCAA Selection Committee releases the brackets for the tournament. Once the brackets are released millions of people will pour over them, carefully selecting each team they think will advance to the next round. Eventually every one of the millions of people will choose a winner.
So who will that winner be? Who is the favorite to win it all as the long road to the Final Four begins to reach the last mile?
Probably the best thing about March Madness – the very thing that allows it to earn the adjective “madness” every year – is the fact that it’s very difficult to know who will suddenly get hot and cut down the nets in the Georgia Dome on April 2nd.
Want to choose the team that’s been hot lately? Well, you’ll probably go with Ohio State who has won their last 13 games and is ready to win the Big 10. Or maybe you’ll go with the Kansas Jayhawks who have been absolutely blowing teams off the court.
But before you choose Ohio State, Kansas, or another hot team, know this: last year’s NCAA Champion Florida Gators lost 3 straight games before they won their last 2 and then made their run for the championship.
The UConn Huskies won it all 2 years earlier but they lost their conference tournament to Syracuse, a team that went no where in the NCAA Tournament.
So maybe you’d rather go with experience? You like a team that’s loaded with veteran players; a team that has key players who made a deep run in the tournament last year.
Not a bad way to go.
However, remember that the Syracuse Orange won it all in 2003 and they had only one veteran player, Kueth Duany, on their team. In fact, that year the Orange was led by two freshmen named Carmelo Anthony and Gerry McNamara. Sure, you’ve probably heard of them now, but did you know who there were 2 weeks before March Madness back in ’03?
You might be tempted to go with the Florida Gators to repeat this year. Certainly Florida has the talent, but a team hasn’t won back-to-back championships in 15 years. Duke last did it in 1991 and 1992.
One thing that seems to be certain is that a team from a so-called major conference will win it all. Sure, the mid-majors will make their noise but when it’s all said and done, it will be a team from a big program that will be standing tall at the end.
Or will it?
Let’s face it. Every year teams from the mid-majors are doing better and better. Eventually one of the teams will break down the door and win it all. Odds say it will happen someday.
Will it happen this year?
It just might. And that possibility will just add to the madness when the brackets come out.
There will be very few teams that will be locks to make it out of the first round. And trying to pick which team will win it all can be madness. Because when you get right down to it, you have no better than a 1 in 65 chance of being right.
Don’t you love the madness?
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