NCAA Post-Season Basketball Tournaments in Full Swing

When it comes down to watching basketball, I prefer college...especially at the end of the season when the big scramble is on as to which teams make the NCAA Championship Tournament and which have to settle for the "second-tier" National Invitation Tournament.  Last year for the University of Florida, at the end of coach Billy Donovan's tenure with the school (before he went on to coach the NBA's Oklahoma City Thunder), the Gators slipped badly and finished, after the Southeastern Conference Tournament, a game under .500, not even getting invited to the NIT.  So with their new coach Mike White, UF stands to at least make the NIT field...although the NCAA tourney at this point is a longshot for this very talented but inconsistent team.  They begin their SEC Tournament tomorrow against Arkansas...a toss-up in my opinion.  Should Florida win that one, they'll go up against ranked Texas A&M...a win in each of these games would give them a 20-13 record which according to some media sports analysts might be good enough to be invited to the "big show".  But going on a hot streak has not been the pattern for the Gators this season: still, it would be a marked improvement from the previous year to play in the NIT should it come down to that...

Although I root for the Gators, my favorite college basketball conference is the Atlantic Coast Conference, home of perennial contenders (and multiple national champions) Duke and North Carolina.  However, in each of the last four seasons, it has been a different team that got hot at the right time and won the ACC Tournament...last year it was Notre Dame, which for some unknown reason gets to play basketball as an ACC "member".  The Fighting Irish sport a good team again this season and would face Duke tomorrow should the Blue Devils get by North Carolina State in today's game.  Yesterday, in the first round, Florida State and NC State won their games against Boston College and Wake Forest, respectively.  I'm about to watch the second-round contest between Pittsburgh and Syracuse on ESPN...

By Sunday evening the different brackets for the NCAA Championship Tournament will have been announced.  Florida will know then if it made the "cut"...and should quickly receive an NIT invitation if it didn't.  Still, Gators or no Gators, I'm going to enjoy this year's March Madness, as they call this great time of the year for college basketball...