While I am not a huge basketball fan I do enjoy the men's college basketball quite a lot more than pro basketball. Part of the reason for this is the attitude or better-said, the lack of it. When you get up to the NBA level it kind of feels like I am watching a bunch of ghetto-millionaires duke it out while talking trash and showboating as much as possible. In college there is still some level of discipline there and a lot of this is because the men are still kind of boys and are definitely open to being molded by the coaches. Also, since a lot of them dream of going pro, they are willing to listen to the coaches who have a really great chance of getting them there. You don't see a lot of egos, fights, flops, arugeuing with refs, and almost never any fights.
Nearly every single NBA game has at least one of these.
I haven't paid that much attention to the March Madness this year but I have been taking notes of the scores every day and for the most part this tournament hasn't been much different from any other with the top seeds for the most part just breezing through exactly like you would think they would. I suppose it was a bit of a shock having Gonzaga exit so early and also that Nebraska made it as far as they did in the tourney. I was surprised to see Nebraska there at all honestly. When they started the season undefeated for a while I thought it was a fluke or a weak schedule. Turns out it wasn't either of of those things.
Besides that, there was a few close games but nothing really out of the ordinary.
One thing is almost always true in this tournament though and that is the almost universal hatred for Duke University.
Why the hate? Well, because they win the entire thing all too frequently. I don't think that anyone really likes it when one team is the best or close to the best every single year but Duke has been really friggin good my entire life and because I was a UNC fan when I was a lot more active in watching the sport, I am obligated to dislike them due to rivalry.
The crazy thing about the Duke loss to UCONN yesterday is that Duke was commanding the entire game and at one point was up by 19 points. It isn't every damn day that you see a team come back from a 19 point deficit to win. It is even more rare that you see the final points scored in the last seconds of the game and the game-winning 3 pointer is scored by a freshman first-year player.
There's a short of the play in question. With .3 seconds on the clock it is kind of tough to score but I'll be a monkey if Duke still didn't nearly pull that off.
In the end UConn emerges victorious and sends Duke packing back to the Carolinas and I think you will find that most of the basketball world is probably pleased about this. I'm not a fan of legacy teams either but I would imagine that this is still pretty heartbreaking for Duke fans and their players. There can be only one! and there are a ton of disappointed teams in the brackets every single year, so don't shed a tear for the Duke players. I am sure that almost all of them already either has their sights on the pros or are ready to come back and make it at least this far in the tournament next season.