I filled out a March Madness bracket. So did you. And the guy in the cubicle next to you? Yep, him too. Your lawyer. Your golf buddies. Even the woman that prefers to watch eliminations on The Bachelor rather than in basketball.
Basically everyone we know, all over the Metroplex, will be consumed by the NCAA tournament over the next three weeks.
Just imagine our frenzy if DFW was actually invited to the party.
For all our hoops hysteria, we haven’t enjoyed a Final Four with a local flavor since essentially the days of peach baskets, canvas high-tops and running hook shots. Prepare to cringe.
There have been 80 Final Fours. Metroplex teams – SMU, TCU, North Texas and UT-Arlington – have made exactly one appearance.
One.
Worse, DFW teams have won only three tournament games in the last 30 years and haven’t advanced past the second round in 50 years. That won’t change this year, as the closest team making the 68-team field resides 90 miles south in Waco. Other Texas teams earning berths are Texas Tech, Houston, Abilene Christian and Prairie View A&M.
That’s right, with two berths since 1998 the Prairie View A&M Panthers have as rich of a recent March Madness history as any DFW school.
The vexing void certainly can’t be traced to a lack of talent.
The Metroplex regularly produces players that shine in the tournament and, eventually, the NBA. Maybe you’ve heard of LaMarcus Aldridge (Seagoville), Chris Bosh (Lincoln), C.J. Miles (Skyline), Marcus Smart (Flower Mound), Julius Randle (Plano), Myles Turner (Trinity), Deron Williams (The Colony) and Larry Johnson (Skyline)?
In fact, we can construct a pretty spiffy All-DFW team.
Point guard: Williams/ Mookie Blaylock (Garland)/ Spud Webb (Wilmer-Hutchins)
Shooting guard: Miles/ Smart/ Ricky Pierce (Garland)/ Charles Smith (Dunbar)/ Desmond Mason (Waxahachie)
Small forward: Bosh/ Johnson/ Randle
Power forward: Aldridge/ Turner/ Tony Battie (South Oak Cliff)/ Dennis Rodman (South Oak Cliff)/ Jason Maxiell (Newman Smith)/ Kenyon Martin (Bryan Adams)
Center: Greg Ostertag (Duncanville)/ Darrell Arthur (South Oak Cliff)/ Alton Lister (Woodrow Wilson)/ Oliver Miller (Southwest)
Problem, of course, is that we don’t keep our own. On their way to the NBA, all of the above that went to college did so out of the Metroplex. By my math – inexplicable as it sounds – the last home-grown stars at TCU and SMU were Kurt Thomas (1994) and Ira Terrell (1976).
That explains our dreadful DFW drought.
UTA lost its only March Madness appearance as a 16-seed in 2008. UNT is 0-3, each time as a No. 15 seed. SMU won a game under Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown in 2015, but the Mustangs’ previous win came under David Bliss in 1988. TCU, which was upset in the first round last year as a 6-seed, hasn’t won a tournament game since current head coach Jamie Dixon was a sharp-shooting senior guard in 1987.
The last time TCU and SMU made audible noise in the tournament, it wasn’t recognizable as March Madness.
The Horned Frogs’ best run was in 1968, when the event consisted of only 23 teams. That squad, coached by Johnny Swaim and led by stars Micky McCarty and James Cash, lost in the regional final by 35 points to a Houston team that featured a center named Elvin Hayes.
SMU’s deepest dive is DFW’s only Final Four cameo. In 1956, the Mustangs beat Texas Tech, Houston and Oklahoma City to make the 25-team field’s last four. That Final Four was played at Northwestern’s gym in front of crowds estimated at 3,500. The Mustangs, 25-4 and Southwest Conference champs, were led by star Jim Krebs, who made the cover of Sports Illustrated under the title: “Big Jim and the Texas Boom.”
SMU, however, lost in the semifinal to a San Francisco team powered by a senior known as Bill Russell. The following year Krebs and the Ponies were eliminated early in the tournament – in overtime – by another decent big man: Kansas junior center Wilt Chamberlain.
Getting road-blocked by the likes of Hayes, Russell and Chamberlain is no embarrassment, and DFW’s empty mantle is actually just an extension of Texas’ troubles. More proof that the only significant sports seasons in the Lone Star State are football and spring football, Texas teams have only 12 Final Four appearances since 1939 and one lone championship – the legendary, all-black 1966 Texas Western team that shocked Adolph Rupp’s Kentucky Wildcats in the transcendent title game.
The Longhorns made the Final Four in 1943, 1947 and 2003, with star T.J. Ford’s squad getting ousted by Syracuse freshman Carmelo Anthony in the semifinals. Unfathomably, Rick Barnes’ teams didn’t reach the Final Four in 2006 or 2007 despite having three future NBA players on each roster, highlighted by Aldridge and Kevin Durant. The ’06 team, led by Aldridge, lost in the regional final to LSU in overtime. National Player of the Year Durant’s team in ’07 couldn’t get out of the second round, upset by USC.
Baylor made appearances in 1948 and 1950. And Houston came close to titles four times, twice with Hayes getting upended by UCLA’s Lew Alcindor in the ‘60s and in the ‘80s with Akeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler losing consecutive championship games to N.C. State and Georgetown.
This year Texas has five of the field’s 68, with Texas Tech and Houston having the only realistic chances of the Final Four as No. 3 seeds. The Red Raiders were upset by lowly West Virginia in the Big 12 tournament last weekend and would have to beat Michigan and Gonzaga to reach Minneapolis in April. Coach Kelvin Sampson’s Cougars, who lost the American Athletic Conference championship game to Cincinnati, have obvious potential hiccups in Kentucky and North Carolina.
So bleak is our DFW outlook that we may be forced to root for familiar players, rather than teams. In that case, Duke sports DeSoto center Marques Bolden and Kansas has Skyline center Marcus Garrett and Southlake Carroll guard Elijah Elliott.
Good news: DFW teams dominated the recent high school championships in San Antonio, winning titles at 3A (Dallas Madison), 4A (Oak Cliff Faith Academy), 5A (Mansfield Timberview) and 6A (Duncanville).
Bad news: Only one of the state’s Top 20 recruits – San Antonio’s Jalen Jackson to UNT – is committed to a Metroplex school.
To get back to Final Fours, DFW teams have to keep the best local players.
But even if they don’t, March Madness won’t have trouble keeping our interest.
