S.E.C T

This archived article was written by: David Osborne Jr.

Game, after game, after game, it doesn’t get much better than this. March really is one of the most wonderful times of the year. With 16-college basketball games in one day makes it wonderful, not to mention the fact that if you don’t win, you go home. Buzzer beaters and Cinderella-story upsets make it a great time to watch a game, or two, perhaps three. Professional basketball continues and is starting to come down to the wire to see who will go to the play-offs and who will miss the cut. Golf is in the middle of Florida right now and the new generation seems to be showing up on the leader board more often than not. Now, onto this edition of the sports editor’s choice.
5- Presidential pick
In historical tradition, the president of the United States of America makes a March Madness bracket for both men’s and women’s college basketball teams. As president, Obama has a record of 1-1. He picked North Carolina to win in 2009, and in 2010 picked Kansas, but Duke walked away with the trophy. Obama has picked that the National Championship will be between the number-one team in the tournament: Ohio State and Kansas. The prediction this year is that Kansas will win it all, and the Jayhawks will once again claim the title.
4- Ineligible and unacknowledged
There are lots of rules when it comes to college football. Many things can make a player ineligible, to play and if they play while ineligible the coach is the person that gets in trouble because they should know what is going on with their players. The Ohio State Buckeyes had to suspend five of their players for the first five games of 2011 season. Now not only will they be without those players for the beginning of the season, but they will be without their coach, Jim Tressel because he knew that those players had improperly taken benefits. In a statement by Tressel, he said, “Throughout the entire situation, my players and I have committed ourselves to facing our mistakes and growing from them; we can only do this successfully together.”
3- Lockout
Players once again show absolutely how selfish they are by demanding more money and not recognizing that the rest of the world doesn’t make that much money. The players are complaining how owners want to give them a fixed salary rate which would keep players from making more money on the projected revenue growth of the NFL. I would just like to point out that these NFL players are going to make the rest of us suffer by not playing because they want to pull in a couple hundred thousand dollars more. So all of those blue collar cities that keep moving forward because they live based on their football teams like Detroit, will now shut down. Personally, I wish that these players were a little less selfish and a little more giving.
2- Who is number one?
World rankings are based on money earned while playing in tournaments around the world; at least it is that way in golf. If you ask Tiger Woods, he says he is still number one. In an interview, when asked who was number one, Woods replied, “When I have my swing dialed in.” Then asked if he was referring to himself, he smiled and just gave a nod. Woods’ goal is to still break Arnold Palmer’s record for most major tournaments won. Woods believes that he can do this, even though he has not won a major tournament since 2009.
1- Time to go mad
March Madness, need I say more? The tournament started, upsets have already been experienced, and of course, most games come down to the final seconds because nobody wants to go home quite yet. Many people are picking Ohio State to win the whole thing, but there are certainly many other teams that can take home the trophy. Most analysts have Ohio State, Kansas, Texas and Pittsburgh in the final four. Of course, those are only predictions and no one will know what will happen for sure until the games are played. Personally, I had the University of Connecticut against Pittsburgh for the National Championship. UConn wins by a final score of 63 to 57. Unfortunately that won’t happen since Pitt was knocked out early by Butler.