If you’re a college basketball junkie, then you are in heaven right now. The 2010 field of 64 is set. In a few weeks time, some lucky team will be cutting the nets and hoisting the trophy as this year’s NCAA champions. Who will it be? If I knew that, I sure as hell wouldn’t tell you. I’d tell my bookie.

Nevertheless, the following cagers will have a lot to say about how deep their respective teams advance in the tourney. Here are ten to watch.

Only four college basketball betting opportunities on the board at sportsbooks worldwide on Sunday, but all of the games are big ones.  On tap are four conference championship battles with automatic bids to the NCAA Tournament for the winner.  The Atlantic 10 Tournament will pit Temple vs. Richmond, the Big 10 features Ohio State vs. Minnesota, the ACC final is Georgia Tech vs. Duke and the SEC Championship will be contested between Mississippi State and Kentucky.  We’ve got plays in two of these games.  Both games start bright and early for those of us on the West Coast…both of our plays are based on a similar premise:

SEC CHAMPIONSHIP–MISSISSIPPI STATE VS. KENTUCKY 10 AM PACIFIC/1 PM EASTERN

Big hockey betting matchup in the Windy City as the NHL’s top ranked team, the Washington Capitals, heads in to the United Center to take on the #2 team in the West the Chicago Blackhawks.  The Caps are running away with the Eastern Conference, leading second place Pittsburgh by 14 points.  At this juncture, the only real goal before the playoffs begin is the Presidents’ Trophy for the NHL’s best record.  The importance of this to a hockey team is debatable.  In theory, its important because it guarantees home ice advantage throughout the playoffs.  In practice, however, its not exactly been an express route to the Stanley Cup–since the league started awarding the Presidents’ Trophy after the 1985-86 season only 7 of the 23 winners have won the Cup (there’s only 23 due to no winner during the lockout year). Since the San Jose Sharks won the trophy last year and got bumped in the first round by Anaheim, they may be happy to concede it to the Caps as long as they win the West.

While I am not a huge fan of the NCAA basketball tourney, I will casually follow it.  It’s fun and exciting to see the players play their hearts out on the court for pride.  Add in the atmosphere of the tournament and I easily get emotionally wrapped up in it all.  I do however try to keep my emotions in check when I watch these games because I get annoyed with the game itself.  Here are a few of my reasons I have beef with college basketball:

Why I will watch less NCAA Basketball this March than you:

1)   The Playoff Format

A few days ago we talked about Polish strongman turned MMA fighter Mariusz Pudzianowski and his recent comments calling out Brock Lesnar and Fedor Emelianenko.  While his fanboys may be preoccupied with notions of Pudzianowski beating Fedor, Lesnar and a back from the dead Bruce Lee at the same time for his second MMA fight, his next scheduled opponent is a more reasonable test of his skill.  While the proposed US fight with Tim Sylvia is still in the works, Pudzianowski has signed his name to a deal to fight a fellow Pole, Robert Paczkow, at KSW XIII in Katowice, Poland on May 7.  Since we’ve talked a lot about Pudzianowski it seemed prudent to get some background on Paczkow.