Is This Your Favorite Day Of The Year?

For some of you out there, today is your absolute favorite day of the year. 

This can be one of two reasons. First, it's St. Patrick's Day. Did you know that TigerBlog once marched in the St. Patrick's Day parade in New York City with his high school marching band? 

More than the wearing of the green, though, today is also the first full day of the NCAA men's basketball and wrestling tournaments. 

This means non-stop basketball today from noon to midnight, followed by another such day tomorrow. These are the two days where teams seeded No. 12 or higher knock off Power 5 teams and do so with highlights that last forever.

As TigerBlog says every year, the NCAA men's basketball tournament is the only major sporting event he can think of that gets less exciting with each passing round. The real thrill of the tournament is today and tomorrow and seeing what player that you've never heard of before becomes part of college basketball history.

When they talk about March Madness, they talk about today and tomorrow.

Forget picking who eventually wins. You should ask who is likely to pull one of the famed upsets. 

The formula is to find a team that is used to winning and is either an elite offensive or defensive team. TigerBlog can give you a 13 who could beat a 4: South Dakota State over Providence, which is this afternoon at 12:40.

South Dakota State is 30-4 and is either first or second in Division I in scoring offense, field goal percentage and three-point percentage. If shots start falling, watch out Friars.

If he has to make a prediction on which teams will make the Final Four, TB would go with Gonzaga, Kentucky, Tennessee and Iowa. If you ask him which team he's rooting for to win it all, he'll tell you Purdue.

The men's and women's tournaments tipped off with their First Fours, which for the men began Tuesday and the women yesterday. Princeton's old friend Tom McCarthy had the men's games on CBS.

The first full day of the women's tournament is tomorrow. The Princeton women play Saturday at 4 against Kentucky at the University of Indiana.

The Tigers are the 11th seed. The Wildcats are the sixth seed. The winner of that game gets the winner of No. 3 Indiana and No. 14 Charlotte.

TigerBlog did a pre-NCAA tournament "Conversation With Carla," which you can listen to HERE. TB was confident all year that Princeton would be in the NCAA tournament, so he saved the team's two seniors, Abby Meyers and Neenah Young, for this one.

Young hasn't been able to play all year due to injury. Meyers is of course the Ivy League Player of the Year. 

As for Berube, TB asked her, among other things, whether all of her experience in coaching Tufts in all those Division III tournaments carries over into Division I. What is remarkable about Berube is that her demeanor never changes. She's the same this week as she was in Week 1 and in midseason.

Before Princeton and Kentucky can tip it off, there is the start of the NCAA wrestling championships. Princeton will be represented by six wrestlers at the event, which is being held in Detroit. 

The first matches also begin today at noon.

The highest number of wrestlers Princeton has ever sent is seven. This is the third time Princeton has qualified six, and the four years in which there have been six or seven Tigers have all come in the last five seasons.

This is from the pregame story on goprincetontigers.com:

Princeton has had one individual champion, with Bradley Glass '53 winning the unlimited division in 1951. Princetonians have made the final five other times, most recently with Greg Parker '03 (174) in 2002. The best finish of the Chris Ayres era (since 2007 NCAAs) came from Matthew Kolodzik '21 (149), who finished third in 2018.

TigerBlog mentions this because the current group of Tigers has a chance to at least match Kolodzik and possibly even Glass. There are two wrestlers seeded in the top five: Patrick Glory is No. 3 at 125, and Quincy Monday is No. 5 at 157.

The other four Princeton wrestlers are Marshall Keller (30th seed at 149), Travis Stefanik (23rd seed at 184) and Matt Cover (32nd seed at HWT).

The morning sessions are on ESPNU. The evening sessions are on ESPN. The brackets can be seen HERE.