Next to my anniversary, birthday and Christmas, the opening Thursday and Friday of the NCAA tournament are my favorite days of the year. Thirty-two games and close to 24 hours of wall-to-wall, do-or-die basketball is enough to satisfy even the most veracious hoops junkie. In fact, I'll wait til later this afternoon to head over to the LJVM Coliseum, where Michigan State plays its opening-round game against Marquette, so I can watch as much action on TV as possible.

My pick to win it all is Florida, but it wouldn't surprise me if North Carolina, Georgetown, Ohio State, Kansas or UCLA walked away with the crown. Beyond that, my one semi off-the-board Final Four pick is Texas A&M, a three seed in the South. George Washington, the 11 in the East, is my lowest seeded Sweet 16 team. If you're looking for a super sleeper in the Final Four, why not Duke in the West? I don't think the Blue Devils are particularly good, but they got a manageable draw with the one seed (Kansas) most likely to flame out, an overrated 3 in Pitt and a 2 in UCLA that struggles to defend the post. The Bruins might shred Greg Paulus, but Josh McRoberts might have a field day inside, too.

A couple last housekeeping items. The selection committee missed the boat with a couple matchups. Indiana's a 7 and Texas Tech's a 10, but the committee chickened out by not pitting Bob Knight against his former team. Ohio State's a 1 and Texas is an underseeded 4, but they're in different regions so we may never see Greg Oden vs. Kevin Durant. That still could happen in the Final Four. If it does, we might be looking at the most hyped game since Bird and Magic played in '79.

I'll check back in to wax about the Michigan State-Marquette matchup later, but enjoy the games.