Madness

March 27, 2023

I filled out my brackets for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament again this year.  In fact, I filled out the hard copy I received in my local newspaper along with eight online versions.  I always fill out the hard copy first.  This bracket represents who I think will win the various games and ultimately the championship.  This allows me to play with the online brackets by picking different scenarios and winners.  One of those brackets is always dedicated to who I would like to win, without much care for whether they have any hope of doing so.  When I checked the brackets today, I found that all 20,056,273 brackets have fallen, and no perfect brackets remain.  I heard from my brother last week the reality is bleaker.  After the Thursday games on opening weekend only 70 brackets were intact.  These remaining perfect brackets fell with the loss by Perdue on Friday.  I guess there is a reason they call it March Madness.

When I looked online, I found March Madness is the trademark of the annual men’s college basketball tournament held by the NCAA from mid-March to early April.  The tournament began with eight teams playing against one another in 1939, with Oregon beating Ohio State to take the first title.  The tournament expanded from 8 to 16 teams in 1951, doubled to 32 teams in 1975, and doubled again to 64 in 1985.  There are now 68 teams who make the tournament, with eight participating in play-in games to make the official first-round field of 64.  March Madness was first used in 1939 when Illinois high school official Henry V. Porter referenced the state tournament in the magazine, Illinois High School Athlete.  The term did not become associated with the NCAA Tournament until 1982, when CBS broadcaster Brent Musburger used it during his coverage of the tournament.  Musburger claims that he got the term from car dealership commercials he saw while broadcasting the Illinois state high school basketball tournament.  He started using it during those High School games and eventually brought it over to CBS referring to the men’s tournament.

The NCAA’s March Madness strictly referred to the men’s basketball tournament through the 2021 tournament.  The NCAA expanded the brand’s use to the 2022 women’s tournament as part of an initiative to bring equity between the men’s and women’s tournaments.  During the 2021 NCAA basketball tournaments, women’s basketball coaches were among the leading voices criticizing the NCAA for gender inequality in its basketball championships.  The Women’s Basketball Coaches Association created a campaign that year called OurFairShot to publicize the NCAA’s favoritism toward the men’s tournament and to pressure the NCAA to make changes.  The OurFairShot website pointed out that the NCAA did not use the March Madness brand for the women’s tournament or on social media.  Although the NCAA’s trademark on March Madness has never had any limitations on its use for women’s basketball, it was never used.  In September 2021, the NCAA announced it would use March Madness branding for the women’s championship in 2022.

THOUGHTS:  While my brackets reflect the madness of this year’s men’s tournament, the three teams I root for all won the first round and two made the Sweet 16 (Arkansas and Kansas State).  Arkansas lost that game (Connecticut) while State pulled off an over-time win (Michigan State), before losing in the Elite Eight (Florida Atlantic University).  While all the top men’s seeds were eliminated, two of the women’s top seeds also fell the first weekend.   Part of the madness comes from the inevitable upsets and Cinderella teams that emerge.  Research shows we root for the underdog because of a phenomenon known as “schadenfreude”, or unconsciously experiencing pleasure at the misfortune of others.  It is thought this comes as we are unconsciously envious that they are doing well.  Now that is madness.  Act for all.  Change is coming and it starts with you.