On March Madness

March Madness. The Big Dance. The Best Four Weeks in Sports.

Starting from Selection Sunday on March 13 to the championship game in Houston, Texas on Monday, April 4, the NCAA puts on a hell of a show every year around this time. It is a spectacle that will never be duplicated. It is an exhibition in postseason gluttony. It is a sight to behold.

I wasn't always like this. I never truly enjoyed March Madness for what it was. In fact, I never even watched a full game of basketball until I was 14-years-old. What made me start watching?

During the 1999–2000 NCAA tournament, the upstart Gators beat such traditional powerhouses as Duke, Illinois, and North Carolina to advance to their first National Championship Game, before losing to heavily-favored Michigan State.

Since that unprecedented run by my hometown Florida Gators, I have been glued to my set every March. Not because I am in love with the idea of 30 straight days of postseason basketball, but because of what 30 straight days of postseason basketball has the potential for — incredible upsets and upstart programs scoring a signature win that catapults them into March Madness mainstay.

You see, when someone says they don't like the NCAA tournament because the whole month is so easily forgettable, they're missing the trees for the forest. I will be the first to admit that men's basketball championship games are some of the least memorable championships in all of sports.

Sure, you can't name the last five NCAA men's basketball champions, but can you remember where you were when the No. 12 you picked to beat a No. 5 actually did it? Did you pick Cornell to beat Temple last year? If so, you're probably still bragging about it to friends.

Or what about in 2001 when No. 15 Richmond (their nickname is the Spiders for crying out loud!) took out No. 2 Syracuse in the first round of the tournament. Do you remember sitting with your buddies during that one?

And to top it all off, the Holy Grails of March Madness memories: George Mason, a tiny commuter school in Fairfax, Virginia out of the Colonial Athletic Association, taking out No. 1 Connecticut in the 2006 postseason. George Mason became only the second No. 11 in NCAA history to reach the Final Four.

March Madness isn't perfect, and I think even the most ardent college basketball apologist would agree with me. But when you have a system in place that not only allows, but promotes, as many upsets and small-school runs as possible, you've got to give credit where credit is due.

It's funny. What should be the most memorable thing about March Madness (the championship games) are more often than not overshadowed by the mid-majors who didn't even make it into the Elite Eight. Start watching the NCAA men's basketball postseason through the lens of the individual storylines, and I guarantee you'll find what's truly unforgettable about March.