In fact, I'm a little like Larry Brown or Blue Chips' Pete Bell when it comes to hoops. If Brown wasn't a Hall of Fame coach turning around yet another franchise in Charlotte, he might be piloting his local high school team...or so he says.
Meanwhile, caught up in a scandal at the fictional Western University, Bell (played by Nick Nolte) confesses to his part in the shenanigans, and walks away from his high-profile gig in order to coach high school ball.
I feel a kinship.
If I wasn't lucky enough to cover the NBA, I would probably string a few high school games for my local newspaper. Basketball is that much fun for me.
And that's why I found myself at the first round of the NCAA Tournament at the Wachovia Center on Thursday.
If you ask the average basketball fan, nothing is more fun than "March Madness." In fact, the NCAA Tournament is one of those sacred cows that's bulletproof. I've found that knocking the "Big Dance" is like kicking someone's dog, at least to the simple-minded who buy the annual hype of the thing.
And as a lifelong basketball fan, I found it amusing when I was recently attacked for telling the truth about college basketball.
You know, the common sense stuff. Things like the fact that the regular season has been rendered meaningless by greed and the mindless conference tournaments. Or the fact that maybe every kid and every coach in the country may not be all that Dick Vitale cracks them up to me.
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You see, I am enamored with good basketball so the real NCAA Tournament doesn't begin for me until Saturday. All the dregs will have been thrown out on their collective ears by that point, and most of the remaining teams actually have something to offer.
It's at this point where I can already feel the blood begin to boil and anticipate your next question -- What about Cinderella?
Well you have been hoodwinked people -- Cinderella is a fairy tale. A story of folkloric characters where the context is perceived by certain rubes as having historical significance. However, the superficial references to actual places and persons isn't steeped in reality.
Since the NCAA Tournament was expanded to 64 teams, the 16 seed is now a sterling 0-98 entering Friday's play, although some may take solace in the fact that Chattanooga kept it within eight touchdowns of UConn on Thursday.
Yep, that's great basketball -- I've seen executions that had more suspense than that. And, in case you are wondering, two seeds have dropped all of four games in the past 25 years of the tourney.
Take a look at the lowest seeds to advance "deep" into the tourney and you see the stark reality of "Cinderella" -- Two 14 seeds (Cleveland State in 1986 and Chattanooga in 1997) have made the Sweet 16. One 12 seed (Missouri in 2002) made the Elite Eight and two 11 seeds (LSU in 1986 and George Mason in 2006) made the Final Four.
Of that group, only Cleveland State, Chattanooga and George Mason would qualify as a so-called mid-major Cinderella.
But, even that misses the point -- last time I looked Cinderella wasn't a runner-up.
To me, many who tell you college hoops offers a better brand of basketball than the NBA are biased against the league and its racial makeup.
That said, the sudden death format of the NCAA Tournament certainly brings with it the opportunity for far more excitement. After all, one-and-done is always more compelling than best-of-seven.
Unfortunately, the NCAA's obsession with creating Cinderella results in far more mismatches than we deserve. There were four games at the Wachovia Center on Thursday, and I was subjected to two stinkers.
The most interesting affair of the day should have been the eight/nine game that kicked things off.
Texas A&M faced off with BYU in a first round West Regional bracket game. As expected, ninth-seeded A&M, led by senior forward Josh Carter and junior guard David Sloan, was the more athletic team.
After Jackson Emery opened the game with a three for BYU, the Aggies scored the next 11 points to establish control, and never looked back.
Things only got worse in the next game as the top-seed in the West Bracket, UConn, hit the floor against an overmatched Chattanooga club. The Huskies dominated the 16th-seeded Mocs despite the absence of coach Jim Calhoun.
Keyron Sheard opened the game for the Mocs by picking the pocket of A.J. Price and igniting the quickly-growing crowd with a fastbreak lay-up. Moments later, Nicchaeus Doaks deposited his own layup and Chattanooga, led 8-6. That was the last lead the Mocs would enjoy.
Chattanooga was down by as many as 30 points in the opening half and trailed by a ridiculous 48-20 margin at intermission. The second half was just glorified garbage time as the Huskies opened the stanza with a 15-0 run en route to tattooing the Mocs, earning a 103-47 win, one of the largest scoring differentials in NCAA Tournament history.
Am I missing something?
Is that fun?
Give me LeBron James until the real tournament games start.
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