Discussion with my 4-year old daughter while watching the Marquette-Stanford game:

Her: \”Daddy, what\’s Stanford?\”

Me: \”It\’s a school that really smart people go to.\”

Her: \”Like you?\”

Me: \”No, I couldn\’t get into Stanford.\”

Her: \”That\’s because you\’re too silly.\”

So it is now official: My wife and I have given birth to my parents. My philosophy of \”silliness\” was a major talking point of theirs as I was going through high school, and now I still get speeches, just from my own kids.

As for the game itself, it\’s a pretty bitter pill to swallow when everyone in the arena can draw up Stanford\’s winning play and Tom Crean can\’t devise a defense to stop it. This ballbreaking final play was actually enough to get me on the treadmill, to burn off some frustration. I also needed to see if I still remembered how to walk after spending three straight days in a catatonic state. I think my wife snuck up and put a mirror up to my mouth a couple times to see if I was still breathing while the tourney was going on.

I also happened to notice that during the Marquette game, the Indiana Pacers were playing the Chicago Bulls. As you may know, former Marquette great Travis Diener plays for the Pacers. Now it just so happened that in the first half of the Pacers game, Diener dove into the stands and sustained an injury that forced him back into the locker room. Miraculously, Diener was back on the court in the second half, finishing out the Pacers\’ win. I\’m sure it was purely coincidence that Diener just happened to be in the locker room for the end of the Marquette game – and I\’m happy that that he healed so quickly from this devastating injury.

During this NCAA tournament, we also got to learn that Kyle Korver of the Utah Jazz has a brother named Klayton that plays for Drake and a brother named Kaleb who plays for Creighton. While I\’m not a big fan of government intervention in family life, I would have no problem with calling social services on the type of parent who slaps their children with matching initials. We also got to learn that this father is one of the \”most outstanding clergymen in the Midwest.\” How exactly do they determine this? Is he ahead of Jeremiah Wright? Did he get to the Sweet 16 in the \”Midwest clergymen tournament?\”

The most ubiquitous commercial during the tournament has to be the ridiculous DirecTV commercial featuring a hot babe trying to make signing up for satellite TV seem sexy. It\’s pretty over the top when she promises the \”ultimate hookup.\” They should have just gone the extra step and had her discuss when they \”plugged the cable into her box.\”

Oh, and congrats to the Badgers for their trip to the Sweet 16. Trevon Hughes had a huge game against Kansas State, who I thought might actually give them some trouble. I actually talked to Hughes at a bar once – a friend of mine mentioned to him that I was a basketball manager at Utah. He asked what year, and I said I started in 1993. \”Oh. I was four years old,\” he said. I then spent the rest of the evening with my head in the oven.

I\’m still wondering why they even play NBA games this weekend. The Badgers have now given me basketball fever, while the Bucks gave given me basketball syphilis.