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Marching Toward Madness

march madness without cable

So. It's that time of year again.

If you're not familiar with this phenomenon, March Madness is what it's called when the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament takes place. For months, people watch teams that are varying levels of proficient get selected for the Tournament, and it's a very quick thing. There are 68 teams selected; after one week, 48 of those will be eliminated, leaving us with the Sweet Sixteen. Then, after another week, twelve of those teams are eliminated, leaving us with the fabled Final Four. One more week to get to the finals and play the championship game, and you can see why this is such a whirlwind of fun.

Here's some terms you may enjoy:

March Madness - The wide-eyed craziness that you get when you think about the games that you could be/are watching.

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The Big Dance - Another name for the Tournament. Getting your dance card punched used to be a thing (I guess), and the act of even getting invited is a big deal.

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On the Bubble - Teams that are doing well are considered to be "on the bubble". This could be a team that is unexpectedly rising above expectations, or a team that is expected to do well and is meeting those expectations. The problem with bubbles is their propensity to break, particularly for those teams who are doing unexpectedly well.

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Cinderella (Team or Story) - References the classic fairy tale, meaning a team that was unexpectedly invited to the Big Dance and is doing surprisingly well. Usually a lower-seeded team - likely a 12 seed or lower.

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Seed - the position a team gets in the bracket. Teams with better seasons (more wins) typically get higher seeds (1-8) while teams with not as good seasons (fewer wins) get lower seeds (9-16). It's always fun to see a lower-seeded team do well.

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Bracket - The tournament bracket - that series of lines that link teams to potential future games. People try to guess what the various teams will do, often "filling out" or "doing" a bracket. The first weekend (which we are currently in) can totally kill one's bracket if the team you'd picked to win does not do so hot, throwing off the whole rest of the schedule. Some people fill out a bracket after each round, but more commonly people will fill out the whole bracket at once. Many people use this as an office pool or friendly-wager kind of thing, just to make things more interesting. I've always found it interesting enough on it's own...

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I'm not one to think I could ever guess correctly. We filled out a bracket when I was a junior in high school (GO BRUINS!) and every team I'd picked to win - lost. I mean, EVERY SINGLE TEAM. It was actually kind of amazing. And as my Utes are playing in the NIT - which is kind of like going to a family square dance while the cool kids go to the Prom - I'm just having fun with it.

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