LARGETONY Blog

I have been trying to hold my tongue on discussing Tennessee’s Men’s Basketball and the NCAA Tournaments (aka March Madness).   The first year and a half of the blog it was easy.  Tennessee didn’t have much of a men’s team to speak of (and hadn’t had in my entire lifetime…and that’s no exaggeration).  Our women’s team is considered (along with Connecticut) to be one of the top programs in the country (with six national championships and the winningest coach–male or female–in college basketball history).  But I’m not into women’s basketball.  I don’t even have a reason why.  I’m just not.

Anyway, a year ago Tennessee brought in a new men’s coach who has turned the men’s program around almost overnight.  It was the team’s first winning season in years and a 20-win season at that (20 wins is sort of benchmark in college basketball.  It’s virtually a dividing line between who makes it into the NCAA tournament or not).  Tennessee lost in the first round of the tournament last year, but just getting there was a huge step forward.

Things have gotten even better this year.  First off, another 20+ win season, including victories over “big-time” teams like Florida and another trip to the NCAA tournaments (I don’t think they have ever been two years in a row).

I missed Tennessee’s first round 121-86 stomping of Long Beach State (you read right: 121 points!) last Friday afternoon because I was at work.  But I did get to see their round two come-from-behind win over Virgina on Sunday at the attorney’s house.  (He likes sports!)

So now Tennessee’s men’s team is going to the Sweet Sixteen.  (For those of you–like 98% of you– who don’t know, the tournament starts with 64 teams in the first round.  The 32 winners from that go on to round two.  The winners of those games become the Sweet Sixteen.  You make the Sweet Sixteen and you are the cream of college basketball.  And now Tennessee is there.

Tennessee has never made it past the Sweet Sixteen into the Elite Eight, and this time they will have to get past Ohio State to do it.  Not an easy feat given that Ohio State has been highly ranked all season.  But, at least OSU is not an unknown quantity to Tennessee.  The two teams met earlier this year during the regular season and Tennessee almost won on Ohio State’s home court. (Had it not been for some questionable officiating, Tennessee might have won).  I’m not going to say Tennessee will win this time, but it’s definitely in the realm of possibility.

Guess that means another trip to the attorney’s house this weekend.  All in the name of being a good fan.

In a semi-related and probably more interesting top for most of you, I have come to find out that The Malcontent is running his own March Madness where blogs are pitted against each other, tournament style, in brackets.  The first round is over and currently there are 32 blogs competing.  Three of the fellows in my sidebar are among those.  So, when you get a moment, go over to The Malcontent and vote for Ajax In The City, Kenneth in The 212, and Stop Touching My Food so we can see them into the Sweet Sixteen.

So far all three are in different brackets.  So there’s no worries of them facing off yet.  But if they keep winning, eventually they will.  I don’t know what I’m going to do when / if they do.

See, Chad, I told you you are “A” list.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 20th, 2007 at 2:10 am and is filed under blogging, topical. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.