You know how ESPN comes up with their catchy names for certain days of their college hoops coverage like Big Monday? Day one should have been called Thrilling Thursday because it could quite possibly be the best opening day in the history of the tournament. Unfortunately, CBS always gets to cover the NCAA Tournament, but just doesn’t compare to the 24 hour full blitz coverage of ESPN, and they basically just do their best not to screw it up. They even brought on a few of the ESPN announcers like my favorite, Bill Raftery and Jay Bilas. With that being said, the actual games helped to overshadow some of the announcers shortcomings by giving us an amazing 3 buzzer beaters and a 3/4 court shot which didn’t count.
The first day of March Madness surely lived up to it’s nickname by giving us some helacious basketball, chock full of upsets, blowouts, and of course game winning buzzer-beating shots. First we will start of with the Murray State Racers(just love the name). It a tightly played contest with Vanderbilt, the Racers helped me stay perfect in my bracket up to this point(until Georgetown laid an egg), when Danero Thomas drained a 20 foot jumper to become part of March Madness lore.
Next up was Washington’s Quincy Pondexter, who took out his frustrations of losing the Pac-10 POY to Cal’s Jerome Randle, hitting a driving lay-up in traffic to beat Marquette:
In quite possibly the most impressive shot of the day, Northern Iowa’s Ali Farokhmanesh, showed why he was his conference’s POY, by knocking down a 33 foot trey with under 5 seconds remaining to beat Lon Kruger’s UNLV squad:
And just to prove that the NCAA Tournament is the best season ending event in all of sports, I bring you Washington’s point guard, Isaiah Thomas(no, not that one) hitting a 75 footer at the end of the first half against Marquette. The sad part is that it didn’t even count since a foul was called on the floor.
And of course, if we are talking upsets here, we can’t fail to mention our beloved Georgetown being upset by Ohio 97-83. It was the first tournament win for Ohio in 27 years! The Hoyas had finished their season strong leading up to the tournament and were thought to be poised for a solid run at the Final Four this year. Instead Georgetown’s season ended early, and now many people are looking to Ohio to be the cinderella feel good story of the tournament.
If you are a fan of NCAA hoops, then don’t forget to enter our March Madness giveaway of 2 Final Four Gear Prize Packs. It’s easy and free to enter, so don’t wait get your name in now!
Allen Moll is an avid NBA and College Basketball fan who watches and studies games religiously and coaches youth basketball in his native Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. Allen is a regular columnist for thehoopdoctors.com, Bleacherreport.com, UpperDeckblog.com, and his own site, Hoops Haven.
