When I was a young child there were only a few days every year that stood out to me as being special. On a personal level, one day would have been the last day of the school year. Now that I think about it, the first day of school brought equal amounts of anticipation and enthusiasm. When it came to holidays, Christmas morning and of course my birthday were neck and neck. In the wonderful world of sports, three Sundays stood out as being the best and most anticipated days each and every year. The most obvious is Super Bowl Sunday, which has always been great but has somehow evolved into a national holiday. Secondly, and this one has grown in importance in my old age as well, Sunday at the Master’s is a personal favorite of mine and a day that I would prefer to spend alone, having absolutely no contact with the outside world. This is especially true when Young Eldrick is in the hunt. So I have a Super Sunday, a Major Sunday and while it may only be thirty minutes, my favorite Sunday was and is Selection Sunday. The day usually lands on the third Sunday of March, four days before the big tournament begins. It allows sports fans young and old to gather around their televisions flipping back and forth between the pre-selection show and the ACC Championship game. Often times that game, among others, still would be undecided when the brackets were announced. Everyone would be on the edge of their seats wondering who the number one seeds were going to be. Dozens of questions were being asked. Was that big upset back in November over Coach K’s squad going to allow their alma mater to earn an at-large bid? Who would be snubbed? What Mid-Majors were going to make a run this year? How does Princeton continue to stay in these big games with ten percent of the talent as their opposition? Jerry Tarkanian? Bubbles? Brackets? It was the beginning of the greatest three weeks in sports. It was Selection Sunday.

Hardly a day goes by in which I don’t hear the phrase or speak it myself, “What did we do before the internet?” Well I can tell you exactly what I did, at least on one Sunday afternoon in the middle of March for about seven years straight. With a pen and pad in hand, I waited to write down exactly when and where the Dukes and Georgetowns of the basketball world were going to play. Even though a tape was in the VCR waiting to record the announcement of the brackets from the East, West, South and Midwest regions, I sat there writing down the numbers: 1 and 16, 8 and 9, 5 and 12...just waiting to fill in the blanks. I knew the local paper would have a bracket that I would be cutting out and taping to the refrigerator but I couldn’t wait. I needed to know the match-ups so that I could begin to try to solve the puzzle. Who was going survive the road to the Final Four? The music would play and chills would run up the spine of my back. As an anonymous group of old curmudgeons drank stale coffee, ate multiple jelly filled doughnuts at some undisclosed location, determining the final two or three teams that they were going to let in to the dance, I would eagerly wait to see who got screwed and who was given the easiest path towards the championship. I waited to watch an entire gymnasium filled with players, coaches and fans leap to there feet when they saw their name flash up on the screen letting them know that they were heading to the big dance for the first time in school history. I waited to see who was going to have to settle for another trip to the NIT. I watched for the speculation, the reflection and of course I waited for the over the top reactions.  

It wasn’t just the announcing of the 64, now 65 teams, that got me all pumped up. It was that this was the beginning of something thrilling and mysterious. The greatest three week stretch in sports was about to begin and nobody knew what was going to happen next. Who was this year’s Tyus Edney? Can we get another George Mason or is it too soon to ask for that? Can somebody please have a bigger game and a bigger shot than Christian Laettner did against Kentucky, circa 1992? Please?

Last week, the creator of the song that will forever be tied to the NCAA basketball tournament, passed away. Doug Towey created the perfect bow to wrap up the college basketball season. I will be the first to admit that, like everything else in our society, the tournament, selection show and all other things March Madness related, have become a little too commercialized. However, I am still able to look past all of the artificial hype and appreciate the first thirty minutes of the tournament, and I try to take in every single minute of action all the way through One Shining Moment. Why do I do this? Why do we all do this? If for no other reason, it is to take us back to when we were young and loved it all for exactly what it was. It takes us back to our childhood. A time when 63 games, now 64, were just that. A collection of games that gave us more than just a tournament. They give us the greatest three week stretch in all of sports. Who is going to be this year’s Santa Clara? I don’t know. Nobody knows. And that is the beauty of it all.