Depending on where you grew up or went to college (or both), today marks the official beginning of one of the most fun stretches in the sports year.  As most of you know, I’m huge a sports fan.  Ironically, college basketball is clearly in that second tier group of sports I follow (with baseball, golf, and boxing).  Ironic because one of my first sports memories is my father taking me to Kemper Arena as a kid to watch Danny and the Miracles practice before winning the Final Four.  And ironic because I’m a Jayhawk by birth and college degree.

You can’t really call one of the most historic college basketball schools in the country as having a tortured fanbase, but prior to Mario Chalmers hitting that 3 and clinching the title for KU over Memphis, we had an embarrassing stretch in the tournament.  Is it better to be a perennial loser who no one has any expectations for, or is it better to have a reputation as a big time choke artist?  For my generation all you have to say is ‘Bucknell’ or ‘Rhode Island’ to get a strong reaction. Again, with a recent title, all those bad reactions are a little more comical: kids storming around campus pissed, standing room only bars that are dead quiet, or my personal favorite, a kid staring at the window of his dorm room, playing the blues on his harmonica. (And no, that kid wasn’t me after Billy Thomas fumbled away the pass at the end of the game that would have led to us beating Arizona.  I don’t even remember what year that was.)

I don’t even recall who I picked to win the tourney this year, but I do have enough of a fan in me to get excited about the possibility of Kansas and Missouri playing one more time on the last weekend of the season.  The odds are against that happening, but who knows, that’s why they call it March Madness…