Making the NCAA tournament

When Mark Gottfried, NC State's new men's basketball coach, arrived three years ago everyone was astounded when he got us to the NCAA tourney his first year.  The second year, based on the talent on the team, it was expected.  This year we were always just off the "bubble" somewhere.  Never in, but never so far out as to loose hope.

Miraculously, NC State was the very last team selected into the tourney this year.  Well, sort of.  I don't know what drunken bet someone lost to increase the field of teams from a nice clean power of 2, 64, to a painful 68.  Before the tournament really starts, 8 teams have to play for 4 spots, to get it down to the 64 teams it always should have been.  State was number 68. I guess this year I should shut up and embrace the decision to go to 68.

They played in the pre-first-sortof round last night and whooped up on Xavier, which all the wisdom in Vegas had as a favorite. Now we play again Thursday night against St Louis.  They are #5 seed (1 is best, 16 is worst), so they should also be favored to beat us.  If State can play again like they did last night, I have a lot of faith we will walk away with the win.

GO WOLFPACK!

If you are interested, the game is at 7:20pm eastern, on TNT.