My weekly column was published today in the Wednesday (Prattville) Progress:
It’s time for March Madness. I’m from Indiana, so basketball is in my blood. Yet, being from Indiana there is an odd feeling to this year’s tournament. For the first time in my memory not a single one of the big schools in my home state (Indiana University, Notre Dame, and my alma mater Purdue University) will be playing in this year’s NCAA men’s basketball tournament.

My first memories of the tournament are of watching the 1987 championship game between Indiana University and Syracuse University. At that time I was not so much a fan of the Hoosiers as I was of their All-American guard Steve Alford, but I was rooting as hard as anyone in the state that night. I remember sitting in my parents’ living room watching the clock run down as the Hoosiers looked for the final shot that would give them the championship. I stood as Keith Smart fired from the baseline and screamed when the shot went through the net. I was experiencing my first championship as a fan. It was really a great feeling. I have been a true basketball fan ever since.

Once Steve Alford left Indiana University, I quickly switched allegiances to the other state school, Purdue. The Purdue teams of the late 80’s were some of the best in the school’s history. It was a great time to be a Boilermaker (the Purdue mascot). As I got older, the NCAA tournament loomed larger and larger in my annual ritual.

I can’t remember the first time I participated in a tournament pool at school, but I remember organizing one for the first time in my sophomore year of high school. My best friend and I ran the pool and prided ourselves on doing an efficient job of collecting the money and distributing brackets without the teachers getting wise. The teachers also looked the other way as we checked scores on radios in our lockers between classes (this was before the Internet). Some, even facilitated our habit by turning on a TV for a while during tournament week, especially if one of the state schools was involved. We had to be extra careful when we distributed the winnings once the tournament was over, but we got pretty good at that too.

It happened that this friend and I went on to attend Purdue University together and kept up our basketball habit. Neither one of us were gamblers, but we always took the annual pool extremely seriously. We also followed the Boilermakers men’s and women’s teams more closely than most. We were on campus with the other fanatics when the men’s team advanced to the Sweet 16 in 1998, 1999 and 2000. We were there when Purdue’s women’s team advanced to the 1999 Final Four by winning the regional final in Normal, Illinois. We would have been there to see the women’s championship, but a trip to California was a little beyond our means.

March Madness is electric, and now I’ll get to see what it’s like to watch a tournament with no Indiana teams participating in the party. I’m sure I’ll learn to enjoy it in a new way.

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