The long road to the Final Four.

Last of my frosty day pictures. Thank god.

---------

Whew.

Just finished making my last picks before Thursday's 11:00 deadline. I don't watch NCAA basketball during the season but I love March Madness. Two weeks of following games, gathering results and highlighting winners in my many brackets.

I have entries in the local paper's pool and a handful national sports sites. I've entered under my name, my son's, my daughter's, my nickname, and if they had counted in dog years I would have entered Cubbie.

My knowledge of who's "good" is acquired from skimming headlines and articles in sport sections and websites about a week before tournament time. This I know: there are a handful of teams that are pretty good every year, i.e., Duke, U Conn, Kentucky, Kansas, UCLA.

In fact even Gonzaga is usually good nowadays; they used to be a favorite underdog pick because of their funny name. Not anymore. Seeded third in the Oakland Region!!

Some of them I like, some I hate. For example: I dislike Duke. I like U Conn. I only picked Duke to win it all in one bracket and I have U Conn winning in three of my brackets. (At least I'm honest with myself. My brother hates Duke and wouldn't pick them to win even if they were playing against Danny DeVito and the remaining munchkins from the Wizard of Oz.)

Anyway, there's nothing worse being two rounds into the playoffs having no teams left in contention for the Final Four. But, never in the history of the NCAA tournament has all four of the #1 seeds made the Final Four. Let me repeat. Never.

So pick the favorites but don't pick all the favorites. Pick some upsets but not too many. To paraphrase Chicago's voting slogan; pick many and often.

Good luck to me.
(I'd be happy with U Conn or a Big 10 team).