The 16 remaining teams in the tournament will be trimmed to the last four by Sunday. Expect to see players doing whatever it takes to insure their team gets a trip to Houston. | (Ethan Hyman/Raleigh News & Observer/MCT)
The greatest sports spectacle of all — the NCAA men’s basketball Tournament — is upon us.
Even better, the culmination of March Madness will be in our backyard at Reliant Stadium.
No other event gives fans such overwhelming coverage. The number of different games to choose from is unlike any other competition.
The World Cup comes close because it shares the same element of unpredictability, but it only comes around once every four years. Plus, a team can lose a World Cup game, but still manage to win the championship. Teams have to earn their spots, and are disappointed or even outraged if they do not make the cut. (See this year’s Virginia Tech team for proof.) There is no cheap automatic invitation for the host team in the tournament — if that was the case UH and Rice would have qualified this year regardless of their sub-par regular seasons.
The win-or-go-home circumstances of the tournament gives a slim margin for error; the loser is given no chance to respond like in a seven-game series.
Basketball purists may argue that the NBA provides a better product because there are less missed free throws, and better decision-making on the court. But the league is part of the problem.
While the NBA does not allow players to enter the draft straight out of high school anymore, the alternative was hardly any better. To gain eligibility to the draft the player must be 19 years of age during the calendar year of the draft. For American players, they must be a year removed from graduating high school.
This has led to the “one-and-done” sensation, where players go to school for a year and quickly bolt for the draft, consequently hurting the college game.
The alternative to that is to go overseas and play for a season, but that blueprint has yet to gain popularity.
Kevin Durant attended Texas for a year before being drafted No. 2 overall in 2007.
Derrick Rose played at Memphis the length of one season and was drafted as the first pick in 2008. Both players were obviously ready for the jump, but just imagine if they spent just one more year in college.
There is no shortage of dynamic players in this year’s tournament. Any college coach would want the talents of BYU’s Jimmer Fredette, or UConn’s Kemba Walker.
If superstar players hung around longer it would add intrigue and give college basketball more fanfare. It would also provide players more time to develop their skills.
Before the NBA changed the rule in 2005, All-Stars like Kobe Bryant and LeBron James never had to seriously weigh the option of playing in college. If the NBA made prospects play in college for two years, they would be doing the NCAA and its fans an unforgettable favor, and there would be plenty more classic moments in the tournament.
"The World Cup comes close because it shares the same element of unpredictability, but it only comes around once every four years. Plus, a team can lose a World Cup game, but still manage to win the championship."
Shouldn't the fact that it only comes around every four years make it special? The journey to get to a world cup is unmatched by any sport. While it's true that you can lose one game and still win the cup it offers a majestic atmosphere that's produced icons like Pele, Ronaldo and Zidane. In 4 years no one is going to remember what Fredette did in this tournament because there will be a new flavor of the week. If he's a bust then he's a bust. In soccer you get to see players develop, there is no one-and-done. In a world cup you have the best athletes in the world, in the NCAA you just have a group of kids.