INDIANAPOLIS -- The 2006 NCAA Tournament will be remembered for national champion Florida and for runner-up UCLA, for the international emergence of Joakim Noah and the return to prominence of UCLA. It will be remembered as the tournament that saw Florida the football school become the best basketball school in America.
But it will be remembered for something more enduring than that.
The 2006 NCAA Tournament will go down as the tournament that changed everything.
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| Thanks to GMU, fans won't be surprised the next time an 11 seed plays -- and wins -- in March. (Getty Images) |
This was the tournament that should have changed all of us. You the fan. Me the writer. And most important, the NCAA Tournament selection committee.
Actually, the selection committee was ahead of the curve on this one.
It was the selection committee that doled out a record four bids to the Missouri Valley Conference, and then looked brilliant when Wichita State and Bradley reached the Sweet 16. With two teams in the Sweet 16, the Valley tied the ACC and skunked the Big Ten, which advanced zero teams that far.
It was the selection committee that gave a record two bids to the Colonial Athletic Association, then looked brilliant when George Mason knocked off Michigan State, North Carolina and Connecticut.
George Mason, whose bid-worthiness was heavily critiqued after the bracket was announced March 12, reeled off the most remarkable Four-figured run in sports -- any sport -- since Roger Bannister cracked the 4-minute mile in 1954.
This was the tournament that should have changed -- better have changed -- the way the mainstream views mid-majors. There's nothing "mid" about lots of these programs.
Nowadays, anyone can be a major. If the coach is good enough and the karma is right, there's simply too much talent to go around. Television shows us the biggest conferences from November to February, but the power leagues no longer can corner the NCAA Tournament market in March. College basketball has evolved past that.
The big conferences are getting the message, too. You think it's a coincidence that this year, out of the blue, Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim endorsed the idea of expanding future NCAA Tournament fields?
Boeheim and the National Association of Basketball Coaches want more teams in the tournament, but it's not because they want to see more George Masons and Wichita States in the years to come. It's because they know they're going to see more George Masons and Wichita States in the years to come. They want to make sure they also just as many Syracuses.
