Casual
MATUS, VICTORINO
Casual ONE SHINING MOMENT Last week I caught up with my old college housemates. It had been several months ^since I'd spoken with them, and, as it turns out, much is going on in their lives. One...
...But wait till you hear this...
...The first round takes two days and involves 32 games in cities like Jacksonville, Dallas, Philadelphia, and San Diego...
...That would be more than either the Washington Post's Tony Kornheiser or the New Yoirk Post's Lenn Robbins got right...
...But which ones...
...Winning the office pool is more than a contest...
...It's about years of analysis, hours in front of the television, and an attention to long-term trends finally paying off...
...But I knew the Blue Devils were relying too heavily on one player and could be stopped...
...Also, remember there has never been a Final Four with all number-one seeds...
...Too much knowledge leads to second-guessing and gets in the way of listening to one's gut instinct...
...There is always at least one twelfth-seeded team that beats out a fifth seed in the first round...
...Two weeks later, the 64 teams are whittled down to a Final Four...
...I did, however, pick two of the Final Four: LSU and UCLA...
...Few thought Tennessee deserved a second seed and, sure enough, they were ousted in the second round by the Wichita State Shockers...
...Final score: LSU 62, Duke 54...
...And none of them is in a position to overtake me during the final rounds, no matter what the results...
...No, I do not count the play-in game...
...It is better to know a little than a lot about your teams...
...I didn't think so, and the Panthers defeated them 82-74...
...People seem always to pick Duke to go all the way...
...But for just one moment, I stand above my peers...
...I knew the Blue Devils were in trouble when I read about LSU's Glen Davis, a 6' 9" forward weighing a terrifying 308 pounds...
...I bet that hurt...
...This led me to choose LSU to beat them in the Sweet Sixteen...
...VICTORINO MATUS...
...No one is perfect, especially in this year's pool...
...It's bigger than any wedding engagement or birth announcement (though maybe just short of your father surviving a difficult surgery...
...Not a single person—me included—thought George Mason would make it to the semifinals...
...The NCAA committee sometimes ranks a school higher than it should, leading to potential mismatches...
...I just won my NCAA office pool...
...Known as "Big Baby," Davis can eat three Big Macs and two large fries in a single sitting...
...Tip-off is usually around noon and the last game finishes up somewhere on the West Coast a little after midnight...
...It's taken me a decade to reach the top and may take another decade before I reach it again...
...The wife of another is about to give birth to their second child...
...It's more than a race...
...Did the Sooners even deserve to be a sixth seed...
...And my achievement is in no way diminished by the fact that, as I write this article, second place looks like it could go to the daughter of a colleague, a 12-year-old girl who had to ask if UCLA was in Los Angeles...
...That's all great news," I said...
...This year's Final Four contains none...
...This year I picked Syracuse to lose to Texas A&M, which they did, 58-66...
...Fans fill out their own brackets, guessing which teams will advance from one round to the next...
...For me, this is an arduous task requiring a careful assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the various schools, some of whom amass winning records by playing cupcake schedules...
...This time each year, mil- N lions of Americans stop their daily routines (and supposedly waste countless hours of productivity) to watch March Madness—when 64 college basketball teams from around the country compete for the national title...
...For a little perspective, of the more than three million entries into ESPN's tournament challenge, only two had the correct Final Four...
...One certainty in my ten years of bracket-filling is the 12-5 upset...
...For instance, I wondered, could eleventh-seeded Wisconsin-Milwaukee beat sixth-seeded Oklahoma...
...But there is one line that bears relevance: Feel the beat of your heart, Feel the wind in your face, It's more than a contest, It's more than a race...
...My name sits atop the list, which is taped outside my door I plan on keeping it there for at least another three weeks, After the national champi-I onship game, CBS runs the cred-° its along with highlights from the tourney to the tune of a song called "One Shining Moment," whose sole purpose is to make grown men cry...
...Others rest on a history of successful tournament appearances but may, in fact, be vulnerable now that last year's seniors have graduated...
...I don't expect to start winning every year...
...And a third just got engaged and, oh, his father is finally out of the hospital, recovering from surgery...
...One is dating a girl he plans to marry...
Vol. 11 • April 2006 • No. 28
