The Grand Views

Issue date: 3/5/10 Section: Opinion

There are two reasons I love the month of March. First, it is not February anymore, thank God. Second, and infinitely more important, it is time for March Madness to begin.

March Madness is the moniker that is given to the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Men's Basketball Tournament. This tournament determines the national champion of college basketball and just so happens to be the greatest tournament in all of sports.

There is only one thing better than filling out a bracket and watching the games every year, and that is filling out a bracket and watching the games every year in Vegas. As a family tradition, my dad and older brothers fly down to Vegas for the opening round of the NCAA tournament. Last year was my first year going, as I had just turned 21, and I had the time of my life.

It's the atmosphere that makes it so awesome. We watched most of the games at the Imperial Palace's Race and Sports Book room, far from the standards and class of the Bellagio's, but that is why it was so much better. It is a room with 20 regular TVs and 230 individual TVs and there is a very good chance that there will be a group of belligerently drunk guys there all day, which are usually more entertaining to watch than the games themselves.

The first round of the tournament often has blowout games because the best team is playing some horrible team that had five wins on the season, but somehow managed to win their conference tournament and make it into the big dance. While some people decide to save an argument with their spouse and watch the latest episode of 'Wife Swap' instead, me and the entire Sports Book room will be going insane because the spread on the game is 28 points and we need some scrub off the bench to miss a free throw with five seconds left to make us some money. He will inevitably bank it in on accident or something and ruin all of our lives, but hey, that's part of the experience.

Some people go down there with the fantasy that they are going to win thousands of dollars betting on the games. I go down there with a couple hundred dollars hoping that by making 10 dollar bets on each game that I can walk away with 50 dollars profit.Last year I ended up down 10 dollars after winning eight of my first ten games the first day and then managing to lose nine straight the next day.

If you consider yourself a sports fan, especially if you are a college basketball fan, you need to go to Vegas for the NCAA tournament at least once in your life. Even if you aren't going to bet on the games, just watching them in an environment where people have thousands of dollars riding on a game is pretty intense, and watching them on six 12-by-15-foot flat screens doesn't hurt either.

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