I was going to say two last thoughts, but honestly, I don’t know that I can promise that. Just got back from Katie’s rugby game to see San Diego State ran over Furman’s Cinderella run to the Sweet 16. So, I guess I should be happy that I didn’t miss anything super exciting.
But this fact didn’t occur to me until this morning. If it wasn’t for the NCAA rules, this might not have ever happened. This is because Merrimack was the regular season champion of the Northeast conference. And Merrimack won the NEC conference tournament. If this had been any other non-power conference, Fairleigh Dickinson would not even be in the tournament. But Merrimack is in their 4 year transition period to Division I. And so, the tournament runner up, Fairleigh Dickinson received the NEC auto-bid, and everything after that is history that will live forever for multiple years. The realization that if Merrimack had been a part of the NCAA for a few more years, Fairleigh Dickinson wouldn’t even exist to have knocked us off kind of makes what happen that much more painful (and should be mentioned a lot more by the media because it adds to the magic of the moment).
Now for the second moment, I remember someone asking me about being worried about some of Virginia’s misery of getting knocked off by a 13 seed this year and of course the historic moment when they were upset by 16 seed UMBC. And I said, I can understand how painful that moment would be, but I have to say this honestly. If you told me right now that Purdue was going to repeat in Virginia’s footsteps by losing to a 16 seed this year and then return the following year and win the national championship, I would take that misery in a heartbeat. I can wait for it – I just want to see it happen once. And so if getting etched in history as one of the biggest upsets ever needed to happen, I would happily do that so Purdue could eventually raise the trophy.
Well, it appears that the basketball gods have taken me up on that deal. And I have realized two things. First, I did not understand how painful that moment would be – it was much worse than I expected. I was super angry when FDU’s Sean Moore hit that 3 pointer from the top of the key with a minute left to give FDU a 5 point lead. I could not sleep last night – didn’t fall asleep until 3 in the morning (which has made today with traveling to DC for Katie’s rugby game at 7:30 in the morning extremely rough). As I watched the games last night, I could get past a reference to remind me of the pain. I am sure that next year, if my Boilers are lucky enough to get back to the tournament again, I will get to relive that moment over and over again. Second, I really hope that the basketball gods follow through with the second part of that deal. I am not sure that it really works that way, but I wasn’t lying. I would be happy to go through this pain for Purdue to be cutting down the nets while they play One Shining Moment at least once in my lifetime – so hopefully, fate will be kind to me at some point.
Well – some of the biggest benefactors of last night are playing now – since powerhouses Duke and Tennessee are playing for the right to play the winner of Florida Atlantic and Fairleigh Dickinson. And the teams are tied at 13 through the first 10 minutes so it looks like it will be a great game. Enjoy the 2nd round of games!!!