THE YEARS BIGGEST SPORTS WEEKEND

 Whatever sport you into, there's probably something on TV this weekend for you, with the possible exception of tennis.

**Baseball - Granted it's only spring training games, but by this time, all the minor leaguers who have little chance of making opening day have been sent down, so the best players will be on the field. There are 14 on the schedule all three days. 42 games is probably too many for me these days, I can't drink that much beer any more. They're televised on each teams network.

**NASCAR - There are three races scheduled this weekend - two on Saturday and one on Sunday, all at Atlanta Motor Speedway on FS1.

**The NBA - There are 25 games scheduled for this weekend. I will not watch any of them. 

**College Basketball - Unless your cave doesn't have cable, you know this is the start of March Madness. Actually, it started the last two nights with 4 NIT games and 4 NCAA games. The NCAA games were the First Four Games or what they used to call, The Play-in games. Eight teams that didn't make it into the 64-team field, but were deemed "kinda good," 

 they got a second chance. Not the best endorsement for your program, but at least it's not the NIT. I heard that most coaches actually asked the team if they wanted to play in the NIT. Some teams (Duke, for one) said no. Still, they were worth watching. Three of the six on last night were one point games. The only blowout was the NC State/Davidson games which was really over with 10 minutes left in the 2nd half. 

The NIT has two games today and two games on Saturday. The final games are next weekend.

The NCAA Tourney has 28 games scheduled for Friday and Saturday. The games start at noon today and probably won't end till about midnight, with the same schedule on Saturday. There could be as many as five games on at the same time. I love college basketball and there is only one thing I won't like about the next two days: I don't know how many times I'm gonna hear all those cute phrases and trite comments we've got to suffer through until Sunday morning. 

"You have to know where so-and-so is every minute." There's only ten guys on the court and you came with four of them, how hard is it to find five guys, especially with different uniforms.

"He's good off the bounce." I assume they mean the ball.

""He can score from anywhere." On the court, on campus, in the back seat...I mean anywhere.

There are more and you'll know them all by Saturday night.

One thing I have noticed. The coaches all wear masks but a lot of them pull them down when arguing with the ref or berating their players. 

**Women's Gymnastics -  There championship tournament is on Saturday. Two 2-hour events involving 4 teams in each event. Total score wins. The players are given scores based on the quality of their performance, so it's all kind of subjective except for when they fall, but they don't do this very often. It is televised so there is one problem. Four teams and four different exercises all going on at the same time, so you get a split screen with four events at once. It's hard to watch. I tried to tape it one year, but Spectrum TV called me and said "Are you crazy? If you want to tape all four exercises, you need three more TVs."

At any rate, this should fill up your weekend. 

One sad note: One of my favorite fighters - maybe my all-time favorite - Marvelous Marvin Hagler died this week from an undisclosed illness. He was 66. He was a true champion, ducked no one and gave his all every time out. His championship bout against Tommy 'The Hitman'  Hearns may have been the best fight ever and certainly the best I ever saw.

***THEY SAID IT***

"A brawl reportedly broke out at a New Hampshire retirement centre during a bingo game. It looked like a hockey fight, except with more teeth."  -- RJ Currie

"The Mets and Yankees will be allowed to start the season at 20% capacity. Presume they’ll make up for it with concessions. So will beers at Yankee Stadium be offered on a low-interest payment plan?"  -- Janice Hough

"The Mariners produced four straight ties in spring-training games March 3-6 — 8-8 against the Cubs, 9-9 against the Rockies, 2-2 against the White Sox and 1-1 against the A’s.And just in case baseball’s rulesmakers go getting any more bright ideas, M’s players are suddenly practicing penalty kicks."  -- Dwight Perry

"Ravens coach John Harbough paid the entire $2200 plus restaurant bill during a Baltimore charity event. So he covered the spread."  -- Jamison Hensley

"Dish Network and Draft Kings  just struck a deal that will allow fans to place bets on sporting events from their televisions during the games. Okay, we're going to need another $1.9 trillion bailout very soon."  -- Brad Dickson

"When we all have a couple days to guess at teams we’ve never watched play and cannot name a single player on, but we’re about to get passionately involved in their winning and losing."  -- Janice Hough

 "After Texas punched its ticket (ugh!) to the NCAA Tournament by defeating Oklahoma State, Texas guard Matt Coleman III, into an ESPN microphone, declared, “This is what I came to school for!” The colleges continue to serve as false fronts for basketball programs. In other businesses, that’s called racketeering. It’s a felony."  -- Phil Mushnick

"A Husker school record was just set in the men's 60-meter dash. The record was set by coach Bill Moos trying to get away from reporters asking why he's afraid to play Oklahoma."  -- Brad Dickson

 "Top-seeded basketball teams have to avoid COVID-19 as well as upsets in this year’s NCAA tournament. It gives new meaning to ‘survive and advance."  -- Bob Molinaro

Chad Picasner