March Madness

Oh boy, I love March!  It's birthday month and it's getting warmer and it's spring break and it's daylight savings time and it's back to grilling and looking ahead toward summer.  Oh March.  Oh yeah, and there's some basketball, too.

Now, I really know very little about sports.  Everything I know about sports I have memorized from ESPN radio, overhead Matt say in conversation with sportsminded friends, or learned from such amazing artistic works as Friday Night Lights and Jerry Maguire.  And I did work at a sports bar for a few years, during which time I learned mostly that I hate Redskins fans and that boys are really loud when they watch sports.  Why so loud?  Ugh.

With the slivers of knowledge I attain from my sources, I like to form very strong opinions.  For example, after a road trip before the NFL draft years ago, I heard stuff about Eli Manning ad nauseum.  Will he ski or swim?  It was all very Cush from Jerry Maguire.  And then and there I decided that I hate Eli Manning, and that he's a drama queen.  Peyton is cool; Eli is a whiny and spoiled little brother. 

And I apply even more brilliant lines of reasoning to my March Madness bracket.  A few years back, in my very first bracket, I chose Gonzaga (who was like a 6 seed or something), to go all the way.  Why?  Because they had this guy named Adam who was so weird and gigantic, and had a pubestasche.  So I was all about Gonzaga, and kept insisting to Matt that Gonzaga would go all the way.  Matt would shake his head in that way he does when he thinks I'm being ridiculous, and I'd just tell him, "You'll see.  Pubestache is gonna do it.  Gonzaga, all the way!"

And then Pubestache fell apart.  Like, apart apart.  Like, Pubestache acted like much more of a baby than Eli Manning ever did.

He threw himself to the floor and cried. 

And then I cried, partly because of human compassion, but mostly because I had lost, and because Matt was right. 

Let this be a lesson to you; never trust a pubestache.

Now, back to brackets.  I fill out the bracket in part because I want something to do, but mostly because I want to pick the winners better than Matt does.  Last night we filled out our brackets together, and Matt told me that I was not allowed to just use President Obama's bracket (he later said that I could use it, but by that time I wanted to be more of an individual).  So I set out to select winners and losers.  Here's what I'm thinking:

• Maryland is going to do well because Maryland is a really good state and I was born there.  Now, they are turtles, which is a mark against them, but they're ferocious turtles, so that helps.  Plus, my friend Bethy is all about Maryland basketball, so I want them to win.
• Georgetown was going to do well because Zoe Bartlett from West Wing went to Georgetown (and I think Charlie did, too).  But they lost.  And Zoe got kidnapped.  I guess I should have thought that one through a little better.
• Gonzaga, of course, will beat Florida State, because Gonzaga is much more fun to say than Florida State.  GONZAGA!
• Ohio State will do well because Becky works there.
• Kentucky will do well because they have that guy named John Wall and he's really good at basketball.  My students made me watch a video of his highlights on YouTube, and he's really good--much better than I am.  Oh, and Matt said I needed to put them in the final four.  Matt's trying to rig our pool so that we'll take home some cash money.
• Notre Dame will beat ODU because it's so close to St. Patrick's Day, and because Matt said so.  Oh, wait.  They lost to ODU?  Even though I was leaning toward picking ODU because I remember drinking really good root beer that was called Old Dominion root beer and I loved it?  Way to lead me down a path to destruction, Matt.  Pfffft.

Okay, so there you have it.  I have Kentucky v. Syracuse in the championship, and Kentucky winning because of that John Wall guy.  Matt has Kansas winning everything.  Other than that, I really don't know anything about his bracket except that it's a sissy bracket for little girls who don't pick upsets.

And here's that John Wall highlight reel: