It Isn't Called March Madness For Nothing

I think that I forgot to mention yesterday that the only way that I could watch Virginia Commonwealth play in their conference tournament was through ESPN360.com. Actually, I believe that I did. I was under the impression today that they would also cover the VCU-William and Mary semi-final match-up in the CAA this afternoon. After ripping the laptop away from my daughter and threatening to give her cat away to the neighbors, I went to ESPN.com and found that the game was not available for on-line viewing. I went to my digital cable box and found the game on pay-per-view. On principal alone, I refused to pay some obscene price to watch one game on TV. Especially, not a William and Mary-VCU match-up that looked on paper like another walk-over for VCU....

So I thought.

I kept tabs on the game score on-line through the sports news and entertainment evil empire. ESPN, don't promise me a game on-line and then don't give to me even if it is William and Mary. Never do that to me again. Do you have a bias against William and Mary? What's wrong with The Tribe? C'mon, Jon Stewart graduated from there! It can't be that bad. I digress.

So I keep tabs on the game comforted that VCU had not lost to William and Mary in 100 years.
However, the scores made me nervous. VCU up by 2. VCU up by 1. William and Mary up by three. However, since I did not actually see the game I can't comment on how it got to the point where the whole game appeared to be dangerously close. So as I am contemplating starting a rumor that Whitewater Hilary is a communist stooge for the KGB (Actually, this is true. Believe me.) or that John McCain dresses like a flamingo dancer in his spare time (Also true), I check the ticker on one of the Evil Empire's channels (ESPN 12?). I see that William and Mary and VCU are tied at 54 with less than a minute left. Now, I am nervous. There is absolutely no way that William and Mary is going to beat VCU on their floor in a conference semi-final game. No way. Where was Eric Maynor? Where was Coach Grant's magic?

A minute later I go to ESPN 127 and find that they have a live feed of the game. I look on the clock and see 3 seconds left. It initially appeared that the score was still tied. Then I looked again and dropped my "salt shaker" on the floor. The line read William and Mary 56, VCU 54. What is happening? This must be an alternative universe where William Shatner is going to come out of the closet singing "Maggie May" and it will all be a silly dream. However, it wasn't.
VCU inbounded the ball by haphazardly slinging it across court. VCU never got a shot off. The buzzer sounded and that was it. The end.

The end of VCU's run at the conference title. The end of the myth that VCU can win in the clutch. The illusion dismantled that no matter the situation Eric Maynor would put the team on his back and lead them to victory. All gone. I did not watch the game and I am now happy that I didn't. Had I watched the game all the way to the end I would have fallen off the wagon and ordered three Meat Lover Pizzas from Pizza Hut. I would have gone on a pizza and potato chip bender for three weeks. In the end, all I can assume was that the Tribe played their hearts out and VCU again shot miserably from the floor and the free throw line and eventually gave the game away. A game they should have won. On paper. But, this is March. March in the college basketball world is the season of the improbable becoming real. Where teams who have no business being on the same court with an opponent find some way to pull out a stunning win. It happened today. To my team. My team that was the team that should have won. Instead, a white guy dressed as an Indian stormed the court with the cheerleaders (no wonder the NCAA wants William and Mary to dump 'The Tribe' as their name and logo) as VCU slipped into the waiting room. The waiting room where nothing is in their control. A waiting room that they have to pray that their resume is good enough to go to the Dance. Where they hope that nobody else steals their at-large away from them. Where March turns into Madness.