🏀 KuBuckets Archive

It really is, the best time of the year. It's March madness, it's the pinnacle of college basketball.

Upsets, Cinderella's, fanatic finishes, 68 teams one goal.

I mean this is the time of year when a cocky Mislose team lost to a 15 seed. Duke too.

It's emotional, it's great its bad its frustrating and cheerful all in the matter of an hour.

This is when power teams that aren't supposed to make it past the third game make the NT game.

This is when Kentucky goes to the NIT every now and then. Or When Indiana refuses to play in the CBI.

This is the best time of the year because since 1990 KU has been playing this weekend. It's the longest stretch ever (and lets face it the only reason they missed 1989 was due to the NCAA holding them out, not the comittee).

This is the most wonderful time of year.

@JRyman madness for sure!!!!! Anyone going to St. Louis ?

@Crimsonorblue22 Assuming we take care of business on Friday I will me in the Lou for Sundays game. I wanted to go both days but unfortunately I have a wedding to attend on Saturday in KC.

@HawkInMizery who plans a wedding during March???!!!! Jk! represent us please-I'm realllly loud! Have fun!

@Crimsonorblue22 who plans a wedding during March???!!

In Nebraska no one schedules them from August thru November.

Ours was mid April, after the Final 4, no football it was perfect.

Hate to burst your bubble @JRyman , but UNC has the longest stretch of invites ever at 27, although ours is the current longest active stretch, and I don't foresee it lapsing before we surpass them.

@konkeyDong Well dang it anyway.

I did laugh at CBS trying to say Duke had been so many straight years, but they worded it as Coach K has made it so many straight years. Because he missed a year of coaching due to his back and they were terrible that year and didn't make it in.

Nobody talked about the KU streak, I think it gets lost because of a few bad loses here and there, but still in the dance.

@JRyman got to say, we've planned a few funerals around athletic events.

@konkeyDong

KU should not have been penalized with a 3 year probation and being banned from the dance in '89 and unable to defend the title.

The violation was a relatively minor, Coach Brown bought a plane ticket so a prospect, Vincent Askew, could go to his grandmother's funeral; Askew did not even come to Kansas and went back to Memphis, Brown fled to the NBA and KU got royally screwed. The NCAA later implemented a program that essentially does the same thing...how bad could it have been?

The University was somewhat arrogant and though the violations were small enough that the in-house counsel could handle it. KU should have done like all other schools under similar circumstances and hired specialized outside counsel to handle the problem; had it done so, KU would have most likely gotten a slap in the wrist and not probation. KU did not even appeal the penalties. Different times, different people and the business portion of the program was not nearly the dominant force it is today.

@JRyman

"Upsets, Cinderella's, fanatic finishes, 68 teams one goal."

Since the rule changes I'm afraid you'll have to add... "totally rigged officiating" in there somewhere.

I can see this getting so bad that refs will face death threats. Fans take their basketball serious and because of the huge potential for variation in the calls this year, it will appear that games are rigged (even more so than in the past).

I hope it doesn't get this bad, but this is what I fear about the tourney this year.

@JayHawkFanToo - depending on the resolution of certain court cases in the coming years, the NCAA will either go back to a completely fascist rule, or they will be forced to act with the decorum of most standard non-profits. In the end... we all plant our feet in America, and certain kinds of group behavior are meeting their threshold of social tolerance.

You are right... different times and different people... add in "different agendas" , too.

If things don't go right for the NCAA in some of these pending cases, the NCAA may not exist any longer, and a new system will be put in place. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that will be an improvement, especially if it gets sucked into governmental bureaucracy!

@Crimsonorblue22 Idk my friend, but I was not happy about ti when my fiancee said that I couldn't miss the wedding to go to STL. Coincidentally the person having the wedding is actually a Jayhawk fan.

@HawkInMizery ha, such as life! At least we don't play on sat.

@Crimsonorblue22 very true!!! If we played on Saturday she may have become my ex fiancee, because in the battle of my Hawks and her friends wedding, we all know what would win out ha! Or either I would have been sneaking the game on my phone with one ear bud in during the ceremony.

@HawkInMizery better keep her, at least you get to go Sunday. Rock Chalk!

@JRyman the days before March madness get lost just like the days before Christmas. Instead of buying presents I am trying to watch the last game of every team in the dance on espn3. Our brackets are our bright and shiny offerings waiting to be picked up and given life by the Dance like a child's torero. Will your bracket be precious? Will it protect itself and mitigate it's early losses? Will it continue to have life until the end or will it be horribly broken and discarded the day it is unwrapped?

@JayHawkFanToo I remember that the word going around was that they had us for worse stuff and we "copped" to the Askew thing.
Of course, this was never verified.

@JRyman Agreed. Selection Sunday is my Christmas Eve and Thursday morning is my Christmas morning.
If possible, I take Thursday afternoon off and go to a Sports Bar that shows all of the games on separate screens on one wall. It's perfect.

My childhood friend growing up in Bloomington, MN (home of Cole Aldrich) now lives in St. Louis. Her good friend is a KU Alum and is going to the St. Louis Alum banquet they are having tomorrow night and going to the game on Friday. I've been promised a t-shirt and any other goodies she may pick up at the banquet/game. :-)

My law firm began 20 years ago holding a March Madness lunch for clients on the first weekend of the tourney. It has grown through the years as the premier invite to get. We have well over 150 clients who are attending this year, with beer, b-b-q, catfish (for Lent), veggies (for vegans), pecan pie, ice cream -- in other words, the WORKS. I'm one of the longest helpers to set up tables, chairs, serving the food and keeping the line moving and then cleaning up after it all. I also have taken lot of good natured hits from the longhorn fans over the years because of my KU apparel I always wear. This year I am proudly wearing my "10 There Done That" 10th straight conf. t-shirt I got (the same one the guys broke out in on Sr. Night). It's like Thanksgiving & Xmas but only better because I don't have to cook a damn thing and get paid for my OT helping out on something I love AND get to watch a number of games on big screen tvs. Isn't life grand? WooHoo!

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@JRyman

Since I am a multiple sport lover, this time of the year is indeed wonderful. Besides the amazing NCAA tournament there is this.

Opening day. In 1988 (and I'm sure in other seasons as well) it coincided with the KU-OU final, what a day!

I'm also a golf watcher and it doesn't get any better than the Masters. So a few days of no TV detox and then the Masters starts and I watch transfixed at the beauty of the course and the amazing play that usually accompanies that tournament.

There's also no football, of course it doesn't stop ESPN from still giving it more attention than baseball, but that's another topic (and a major pet peeve of mine).

@drgnslayr, I wish I had the know how to find the play and post pictures of it here, but last years elite 8 game between Marquette and cuse was exhibit 1A of what you're talking about. I'm still shaking my head over a call that went against Marquette, too complicated to describe here, but when a team as physical as Syracuse has 5 total fouls half way through the 2nd half something is up.