Ladies and gentlemen, it is that time of year again - time to kick off the shoes, lay back, relax and watch 64 of the world's best teams slug it out with each other for the title. That's right, there is war in Kosovo! And CNN brings it to us live each day, with up-to-the-minute scores. So far, the U.S. and friends are soundly defeating Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, largely because Serbia's interior defense is no match for our three-point shooting skill (in the form of big scary bombs). CNN is reporting that we may score again any minute now. Swish, three points for us and minus one factory for evil Kosovo!
If a war were not Madness enough, the NCAA also decided to hold its annual basketball championship tournament this month. The yearly tournament, held in March, is usually filled with Madness of such an intractable magnitude that many NCAA marketers and officials have taken to referring to the event simply as "An Extremely Profitable Way To Exploit of Hundreds of Young People." It is no coincidence that Nike is the tournament's premier sponsor. The workers paid by Nike to write athletes' term papers during the rigorous season are paid only a tragic eight cents per hour, which can be upped to 12 cents, provided they don't use anything other than nouns. ("You know, to keep things believable.")
But at least we are finally on the topic of "March Madness," or the "Big Dance," or the "Titanic Serving of Bangers and Mash," as the tournament is also sometimes called. The annual men's college basketball championship is awarded to whichever team survives this "Colossal Tango," whose 64-member field is selected by a Committee of Basketball Analysts and Experts, who ask themselves the following three questions: 1. Which teams deserve a shot at the championship? 2. Which team does my son play for? 3. Who shot J.R.?
Realizing that there are no clear-cut answers to any of these questions, the Committee of Basketball Analysts and Experts throw darts at a map until at least 50 land on the continental United States, after which point they just "wing it."
This is how teams such as Samford and Winthrop, which actually consist of one player each (named "Samford" and "Winthrop"), made it to the tournament this year. Both teams blamed their convincing first-round losses on the painful stinging. "Those darts came out of nowhere!" said a defeated Winthrop, making his first NCAA tournament appearance since high school, when he suffered a last-minute heart breaking loss at the hands of an elderly cow who could not get out of the way of a dart in time. "Although we were aiming at North Carolina, the cow has to play," said the committee. "The darts don't lie."
Many believe that 64 teams are an unnecessary amount for a single tournament. As respected ESPN commentator Dick Vitale puts it, "Most of the teams, annually, have absolutely no shot. Florida A&M against Duke? Come on." Defenders of the tourney's expanded field, conversely, point to the several upsets which provide much of the excitement of the competition each year. For instance, Florida A&M made it all the way to the arena this year before losing their first-round game to Duke by 40 points, and Southwest Central Bengali State shocked the sports world by making it all the way to the airport before being eaten by tigers.
Oh, but the upsets do not end there. Little-heralded Gonzaga College won three consecutive contests until they were dismissed from the proceedings by the NCAA because "Gonzaga isn't even a real state, we don't think." Similarly, Ohio State University, led by a player named Scoonie, advanced to the Final Four, before being disqualified for "being led by a player named Scoonie." (The same rule applies to being led by a player named "Slobodan.")
All of this led up to this year's championship game, which pitted the traditionally fearsome Blue Devils of Duke, the top seed in its region, against a group of Huskies from the Yukon, which was the first Alaskan college ever to emerge from the "Sixty-three Other Teams Fight For The Chance To Play Duke For The Championship" bracket. "We cannot play without pits!" the teams decried, but the pitters would not listen.
Duke's captain, Trajen Langdon, controlled the ball in the final seconds of play with his team down by only three points, but his game-winning shot was overruled when it was discovered that all season long he had been using adjectives in his term papers. Thus, the team from the Yukon stood victorious, 77-74. But the Blue Devils were winners in their own right. Really, nobody in these games is a loser, says conventional wisdom. Unless they score less points, the wisdom continues. In which case they win national shame, to go along with their trophy for Most Satanic Blue Mascot.
And so a majority of the Madness was put to rest on Monday. Many are already predicting a repeat of this year's thrills in 2000, however. There are high hopes for Zimbabwe Tech, although insiders report many lions in the area. We also hear that Scoonie may be transferring to Gonzaga, leaving his father unsure as to which team the Committee should select for next year's tournament. And we may finally find out who shot J.R., provided that Serbian leader Milosevic does not make a comeback late in the game.
