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The Daily Wildcat

The Daily Wildcat

 

UA fans relaxed for drama

This is one dance for which you don’t want one date.

Tied down to one drama queen would blind your fandom from the mosh pit of Gus Johnson one-liners flying around like paper airplanes.

But those paper airplanes actually contain your brackets, creased to a point and folded up in bitterness, flying first class to the nearest fireplace.

The NCAA Tournament is burning down Las Vegas, and the only thing to do is mail in a prayer now that Arizona didn’t distract you from the true beauty of these 48 games in four days.

Not even Chatroulette.com could select a more random group of faces.

Forget just regulation: Most exciting first day — chalk full of overtimes — in history? Check.

Forget just updates: Biggest first-weekend upset — a No. 1 seed — in history? Check.

Overall No. 1 seeded Kansas is out. So is Villanova and Georgetown.

Overall unknown Northern Iowa is in. So is Cornell and St. Mary’s.

Just let the numbers talk:

• Thirteen games this weekend were decided by one possession. Four went into overtime.

• Eight teams with double-digit seeds won in the first round. 

• Of all the Sweet 16 teams, six come from non-BCS conferences. Almost one third of the Round of 32 teams hailed from non-BCS conferences.

• Three double-digit seeded teams made the Sweet 16: No. 12 Cornell, No. 11 Washington and No. 10 St. Mary’s.

• Eleven conferences are represented in the Sweet 16.

In last season’s yawner of a Tourney, No. 12-seeded Arizona was the highest seed to make the Sweet 16 — and who could really consider that an upset or Cinderella story?

This season, an all-mighty Big East gagged. The mid-level meat of the conference — Georgetown, Notre Dame and Marquette — all lost to double-digit seeds.

Meanwhile, your favorite conference that became subject to ridicule and disrespect all season — the Pacific 10 Conference — went 2-0 against the Big Least.

Of course Connecticut was never in it. But neither was North Carolina or Arizona.

So isn’t it great to just be a spectator for this one? For the first time in 25 years, Arizona fans aren’t handcuffed to one corner of the bracket, playing the “”what-if”” game and gazing three levels too far into the Tournament.

“”So we just have to beat ‘team,t who already lost to ‘team,’ who we beat earlier this season, in order to make the Final Four?”” you would say. “”I’m on Southwest searching for flights.””

It’s a tournament that makes fans take one step back and exhale, exhilarated by Twitter’s trending topics like #BracketFML and #WritingChecksToBookie.

There’s nothing else to do but just dance.

—Bryan Roy is an interdisciplinary studies junior. He can be reached at sports@wildcat.arizona.edu.

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