Savoring the Week Before Selections

It will start early on the morning of March 12th. People will gather around water coolers-or wherever it is people gather these days -- all of them with NCAA Tournament brackets in hand. They will be searching for this year's George Mason, an 11th seed that will upset one higher seeded team after another. Or they'll hope to find a Wichita State, a 10th seed that can reach the Sweet Sixteen. And they'll all debate who is going to end up in Atlanta for the Final Four. Ohio State? Florida? North Carolina? Kansas? Butler?

Some will pick with their heads. Others with their hearts. My wife used to pick teams with coaches she thought were good looking. Or schools her brothers graduated from. In 1989, she picked Seton Hall to beat Indiana in the Sweet 16 because her dad went to Seton Hall and P.J. Carlesimo, then the Pirates coach, had dated a friend of hers. I talked her out of it. "If there's one thing I know, it is that Bob Knight isn't losing to Seton Hall," I told her.

Seton Hall won by 20. I haven't opened my mouth since then.

Every year my brother calls me and asks for help with his bracket. I refuse on the grounds that when I'm wrong (and I'm always wrong) he'll blame me. If, by some chance, I'm right, he'll take all the credit.

The sad thing for all those people who will grab bracket sheets next week and start trying to figure out exactly where Winthrop is located is that they will have missed the best week of the basketball season.

That's this week.

There is nothing better than a college basketball game where the teams involved believe they MUST win in order to get into the tournament, or as the cliché now goes, "The Dance." For the power schools, getting into the tournament is part of the job -- and at that level playing basketball IS a job -- something that is expected just about every year. When Maryland managed to miss the tournament two years in a row, one might have thought that Gary Williams had never won a game in his life, much less a national championship in 2002.

"All of a sudden people think I've remembered how to coach again," Williams joked last week after Maryland had reeled off a seven-game winning streak to wrap up a tournament spot. "You miss the tournament a couple years and people think you've forgotten everything you ever knew."

Which is why, when teams from the big-time conferences -- the ACC, Big East, Big Ten, Big 12, SEC and Pac-10 -- make the tournament there is more a sense of relief than joy. In the minds of most, those teams are SUPPOSED to make the field every year. That's why, if you go to one of the big-time conference tournaments you will hear the derisive chant of "NIT" directed at teams that are about to lose and don't have enough victories to make the NCAA field. What was once The National Invitation Tournament is now known to many in college basketball as the "Not Invited Tournament," because it is the consolation event for those who don't make the NCAA field of 65.

That's why, if you wanted to see basketball at its most desperate you wanted to be in Richmond last weekend for the Colonial Athletic Association Tournament. The CAA had four teams with more than 20 victories AND George Mason, which finished sixth in the league a year after its miraculous Final Four run.

As good as the league has become and as much as its national profile has increased because of what happened last March, no one in the CAA felt certain of a bid going into the tournament. "The only team that's guaranteed a bid coming out of here is the team that wins the championship," Hofstra Coach Tom Pecora said. "Everyone else has to hope. You don't want to spend the week sitting around hoping."

Pecora knows from whence he speaks. A year ago his team beat George Mason in the CAA semifinals before losing the championship game to UNC-Wilmington. On Selection Sunday, Mason was in, Hofstra was out. This year, hoping to take hope out of the equation, Hofstra came into the tournament with 22 victories. Its quarterfinal opponent? George Mason, struggling at 16-14. But the Patriots found the magic again that night and Hofstra was left to again hope -- this time with little reason to -- knowing it will almost certainly be heading to the NIT again.