March Madness by Bob Krech

Think about March Madness as offered up by the NCAA. Why do they call it March Madness? It's sixty-eight of the best college basketball teams in the country playing each other in a very carefully bracketed tournament. On paper it's all organized, calculated, numerical, symmetrical, and scheduled. What's mad about that?

Me, my ball, and my books. Ready for the madness to start!

It's so fantastic to me that within this rigid structure, every year, things do indeed get pretty mad. Within that staid-looking framework, anything can happen, and often does. The little college knocking off the perennial powerhouse. The last minute comeback. The shot from half court at the buzzer that goes in. The bench player who gets hot and has the biggest game of his or her life in the full glare of a national television audience. Every year there is drama, surprise, obstacles, conflict, heroism, mistakes, comebacks, incredible feats, and well, madness. It's true for the fans, the coaches, the players, and even the commentators.

It's a landscape full of stories, big and small, and all of the elements that make for a great story are right there in every game. For the next few weeks, much to the detriment of my writing life and pretty much everything else, I will be watching as many of those stories unfold as I can. I'll have plenty of company too. Everyone likes a good story. And a little madness.