March Sadness

Its my favorite time of year, March Madness but because of the sad state of our athletics department I have decided that this year we should call it March SADness. With the women's team not making the NCAA tournament for the first time in 17 years and the men's team decimated by injury, it just doesn't have the same feel. We knew it would be a tough women's basketball season after losing 5 seniors from last years elite eight team but no one saw this change coming for the men. All of the hopes and dreams for a final four appearance seemed to go down the drain with the tearing of Robbie Hummel's ACL. Obviously the NCAA selection committee thought the same since we went from a possible 1 seed all the way to a 4 seed- a 4 seed that not many people are picking to get out of the first round. The attitude around the fan base has drastically changed (especially after Saturdays blow out loss to Minnesota) and the department has pretty much followed. We are still hopeful the team will come out of its shooting slump and get back to the confidence they had earlier in the season. As I watched them at practice today it doesn't seem possible but I can still hope. As for the women, tonight we find out about the NIT which is a whole other kind of disappointing but with a young team, we just need more opportunities to play. I still filled out my bracket and hope to enjoy the next few weeks of games. No traveling with any teams this year for me but I'm still keeping my fingers crossed the men's team will put on a good show in Spokane and surprise us all.