March Madness is Sweeeeeeeeeet!

I'm not much of a sport's fan. Being the eldest of three girls doesn't help, and my dad is not a huge sports guy. I watch the Olympics and the World Cup when it comes around. I used to cheer on the Houston Rockets way back when Hakeem Olojoun was the best player on the team, but I stopped watching NBA games when he, Michael Jordan, and all the great ones left and the teams started falling apart.

March Madness? What is that anyway...for a while I had no idea what the heck it was. College basketball? Nothing big for me because George Mason University doesn't have a football team which is usually what gets American students riled up about college sports.

THEN...
George Mason's Men's Basketball team made it to the Sweet 16!
I'll let the experts explain:

The first week of the tournament was packed with upsets. Six of the top teams, including basketball powerhouses Ohio State (a No. 2 seed), Tennessee (also a No. 2) and North Carolina (No. 3) got knocked off by teams with lower seedings (a higher number on a 1-to-16 rating). That means they lost to teams the NCAA committee and other basketball experts thought were not as good.

Two of the biggest surprise teams were local favorites George Mason (a No. 11 seed) and Georgetown (No. 7). George Mason beat Michigan State (No. 6) and North Carolina, two schools that were in the Final Four last year. That's pretty good for a team some folks thought should not even be in the tournament.

Hell ya, it's amazing! And now my school is going crazy :) Sports does that to people, especially the NCAA tournaments. Everyone from students to alums to 70-year old neighbors of the university are having a blast watching Mason upset the top teams in the country.

For employers, March Madness means distractions and lack of productivity to the tune of $3.8 billion in estimated losses.

In any case, TONIGHT is the big game, with Mason's Patriots playing against Wichita State right here in DC's Verizon Center. Tip off is at 7:27 PM on CBS.

Cross your fingers and cheer for MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAASON!

Update: We woooooooooooooooooon! We WON! Off to the round of 8 :D


[technorati tags: sports, NCAA, George Mason, March Madness]