Madness is a good thing: Basketball season winds down but kicks up

T he greatest time of the year is upon us. I’ll give you a hint — it rhymes with Shmarch Shmadness.

From bowling in college football to dancing in college basketball, the metaphors only get better as the wide, wide world of sports cycles to another annual phenomenon.

It’s a time of year when the Final Four doesn’t refer to the remaining contestants on “American Idol.” When diaper dandies aren’t just the worst part of a babysitter’s job. When the only thing Justin Timberlake is singing is Memphis’ fight song. It’s a time when Cinderella wears sneakers.

It was a season where the No.1 ranking was about as fickle as Billy Gillespie’s loyalty.

The best point guards weren’t simply the ones wearing the forearm sleeves.

The conference tournaments had as many upsets as the stock market. There was so much parity that narrowing 347 teams down to 65 needed madness to the method.

But this time of year, madness is a good thing.

March Madness is an American tradition. Even people who don’t follow sports fill out brackets.

People who do follow sports get as stoked as a campfire. They feed off the frenzy of four days saturated with 48 games. They immerse themselves in Gus Johnson’s masterful play-by-play while hoping for more on-camera courtside reporting by Erin Andrews. For about two weeks they stop worrying about the Ides of April, aka Tax Day.

However there’s no reason to beware the Ides of March.

Selection Sunday is the genesis of a beautiful thing — bracketology. There are the conservatives sans cojones who seem allergic to upsets. I don’t care that all the No. 1 seeds made it to the Final Four last year — grab the Tiger by its whiskers and the Reddie by its … wisps. There are the audacious liberals who will pick a No. 16 seed to beat a No. 1 seed, which is dumber than asking Ms. Teen South Carolina about geography.

Then there are the naïve tweeners who need a “jump-to-conclusions” mat just to figure out their Elite 8.

As for girls picking their brackets, it gives me déjà vu of Pandora’s Box; almost nothing good can come out of it, but there’s always hope.

As for me, I just pick Duke to lose as soon as possible.

Games and mascots add to the greatness. Nowhere else can a crowd get away with chanting “Let’s Go Peay!” (Sadly, Austin Peay didn’t make it this year). As for a team who did, I’m not sure if “Zips” is a noun or a verb, but rock on Akron.

I think the next time Youngstown State gets a bid their team theme should be “March of the Penguins.” Then there’s Alabama State’s 7’1’’ center Grlenntys Chief Kickingstallionsims Junior. Enough said.

For all the rest, the play-in game is the match, and the subsequent round is the kerosene. Ouachita is lucky the gist of the tourney coincides with spring break. The madness makes students so inefficient they couldn’t kill one bird with two stones.

At least it’s only a brief addiction — but an addiction nonetheless. My Catholic friend couldn’t imagine giving up college basketball for Lent.

Maybe some day college will offer a class where picking a bracket is the mid-term. But I guess that would be the day the world truly went mad.