I’m not about to write many highly analytical words. There isn’t a breakdown coming of offensive and
defensive efficiencies, match up summaries, or shooting tendencies. If you want that, read what JG
wrote and all of its graphical glory. And if you’re anything like me or JG, you’ve spent a good portion of
your week absorbing things like Nate Silver’s bracket projections, other simulation based results, and
listening to experts pick this thing. There’s a basis for it all: to make educated and unbiased selections
or prediction of what will transpire in the most unselectable, unpredictable three weeks of madness
you can find. Silver himself notes that Florida, who has the best odds to win, still has a greater than 80%
chance of not winning the thing.
Which brings me to my point of blind optimism. Sure we can temper our expectations but why be
reserved when it’s all on the line? The actual team had better not be reserved, so why not the fans, too?
We’ve arrived at what amounts to the most exciting time of year. We’ve scoured over all of that data
but you know what data we’ve left out? The fact that we’ve also witnessed every permutation of upset,
shock, and awe (a one over a sixteen withstanding). That’s my favorite prediction. That everything we’re
about to see is so completely and utterly unpredictable that we can’t help but tune in, we can’t help
but think our team can be the exception and not the rule. Butler was. VCU was. Even Connecticut’s
run through the Big East tournament and NCAA tournament in 2011 was improbable, magical, and
exhilarating (the title game itself excluded).
The ultimate question to ask is whether or not the Colorado Buffaloes have a chance? They do. Because
the game will be played and two teams will try to outscore the other (this one, by the way, projects
to have very little scoring). This tournament is adored for its process and its outcome. It’s the purest
rendition of sport, the closest we get to our gladiator roots. Everything is heightened: the odds, the
intensity, the drama, the competition. It’s our hope that our team rises higher than the others, higher
than the expectations, and does what we can hardly fathom. That’s March.
I’m not about to list out a miracle scenario where CU runs into the national title game; but I’m not
going to slap you in the cheek and call you a moron if you can see one. I see a red and blue one every
single time I complete a bracket. That’s what being a fan is. You can protect yourself from a perceived
certainty or embrace the opportunity for a moment. Sometimes it hurts but most of the time it doesn’t.
Allow me a Waltonian close.
We’re coming out of winter. The clocks and temperatures are changing, the snow and ice melting, the
clouds parting. Swiftly we’re making our way to Spring. The sun is coming out and how quickly did you
get to the park, or the running trail, or the outdoor patio with bottomless mimosa brunch? You sought
the sunshine. Not the gloom. We celebrated, even if it were ever so brief, that shining moment.
