Tonight is the first night of the Sweet Sixteen. The Sweet Sixteen is where the NCAA Tournament transitions from strictly numbered rounds (“the round of 64/32” or “the first/second/third round”) to rounds with catchy nicknames. The Sweet Sixteen reduces the field from 16 teams to 8, the Elite Eight winnows it down from eight to four, those four are referred to as the Final Four, and the two teams that win those games go on to play each other in the Championship game. The four games on tonight represent half of the Sweet Sixteen. The other four games will be tomorrow. For now, let’s run through these games and see what they mean.
NCAA Men’s Basketball – #7 Wichita State Shockers vs. #3 Notre Dame Fighting Irish, 7:15 p.m. ET on CBS.
When a 7 seed beats a 2 seed, like Wichita State did to Kansas in the last round, the standard narrative would be to view them as a surprise, Cindarella-like team. It’s hard to view Wichita State that way though because of their recent history of success. Two years ago they went to the Final Four and last year they were a 1 seed that lost only to the eventual runners-up, Kentucky. Wichita State is not an underdog but they’re also not unworthy of support. As a member of the Missouri Valley Conference, they still represent college basketball’s sympathetic second tier in a way that Notre Dame never could. Unless you’re a Notre Dame fan, I suggest throwing your support behind the Shockers.
NCAA Men’s Basketball – #4 North Carolina Tarheels vs. #1 Wisconsin Badgers, 7:47 p.m. ET on TBS.
Wisconsin became my (and lots of other people’s) favorite team in the tournament this year when the team’s fascination with short-hand became public last week. That’s right, after their win last weekend, what seems like a majority of their press conference was focused on the team’s interest in the stenographer who was transcribing it. Nigel Hayes, a 6’8″ power forward, even sprinkled his answers with complicated and unexpected vocabulary words just to make things more interesting for her:
That’s enough for me — I’m now rooting for the Badgers to make it all the way to the Championship game.
NCAA Men’s Basketball – #5 West Virginia Mountaineers vs. #1 Kentucky Wildcats, 9:45 p.m. ET on CBS.
Everything in the tournament, even the stenography obsession, is just a side-show to the ongoing saga of the Kentucky Wildcats. They’re undefeated and looking to become the first team to go through the entire season and win the championship without losing a game since the 1976 Indiana Hoosiers. There are only a few teams out there who are talented enough to challenge the Wildcats. The West Virginia Mountaineers are not one of those teams but they may be crazy enough to think they are and tough enough to have a shot despite their difference in talent.
NCAA Men’s Basketball – #6 Xavier Musketeers vs. #2 Arizona Wildcats, 10:17 p.m. ET on TBS.
Arizona is one of the few teams with talent enough to match up against Kentucky. That should give them more than enough class to get past the Xavier Musketeers tonight. The best character on either of the teams is a senior center on Xavier named Matt Stainbrook who gave up his scholarship to his little brother, Tim, who is also on the team. The elder Stainbrook has been making some extra cash in his free time as the world’s largest (I’m guessing) Uber driver.