March Madness is just around the corner. Here are facts about this event. | Image source: CFB Roundtable
As a graduate coordinator, I understand completely how important March Madness is to students around campus. Many of them would support their favorite teams in the final weeks of the college basketball season.
How well do these students know about March Madness though? If you may allow me to, I’ll present a few facts which I know about March Madness. While I’m not much of a basketball guy myself, I can definitely say something based on experience.
- Betting is not allowed.
The NCAA has strict regulations against gambling. Hence, no matter which team is your favorite, you can’t simply bet on them. You might run into trouble!
- Harvard made its first March Madness appearance in 2012 in a long time.
Surprisingly, it was only in 2012 that Harvard appeared in the tournament since 1946! This is surprising, considering the Ivy League university has quite the reputation in the academic world, but apparently not so much in sports.
- Only eight teams competed in a first NCAA tournament.
Nowadays, there are about 64 teams who’d duke it out just to win in the final season. This means that in the beginning, all the other schools were never really given the opportunity to make waves within the athletic world!
- The UCLA basketball team holds the most title.
At 11 wins, UCLA is definitely on a roll here—with ten of them earned from 1964-1975. But who knows what will happen in the future?
- Commercials for March Madness cost millions of dollars.
Although not as pricey as the commercials during Super Bowl, March Madness commercials are rather expensive nonetheless—with a 30-second commercial at $1.34 million! That’s a hefty amount.
Are you ready to tune in to this year’s March Madness? Let me know your thoughts.
Russphillips 