Enjoying or at least trying to enjoy March Madness and more

        The Parker house has been filled with March Madness craziness of late.
       Over the course of the last five days, Thursday to Monday, Debbie and I have watched all or part of at least a dozen or more basketball games.
       At times, we have had three or four games going at once while listening to another on the radio.
      There have been plenty of missed calls, nose punches, foul words, knock downs, great heart-stopping plays, last minute comebacks, flamboyant colorful coaches, know-it-all commentators and crazy fans who spent hundreds of dollars and traveled all over the country to watch college basketball.
       The craziness always starts with selection Sunday when the committee, whoever they are, sets up the games. We all complain about who is playing who and who got left out, but in the end, there are always some great games and upsets.
        This year’s tournament has been no exception!
       And every year we fill out on-line brackets, only to have them busted in the first round. As Debbie says, the experts don’t know what they are talking about.
       And for the Iowa teams, the Hawkeyes and Caitlin Clark pulled out a nailbiter against West Virginia, rallying late on Monday night in the 64-54 win to advance to the Sweet 16.
      We are all rooting for and love Clark and the Hawkeyes. I kind of think a lot of basketball fans across this nation are rooting for the Hawkeyes.
      And what a great Iowa State women’s team. What a performance that was by freshman Audi Crooks scoring 40 points against Maryland, who is coached by Brenda Frese, a former ISU player. The lady Cyclones season came to an end in a tough loss to number two Stanford, 87-81.
        What a great season for them.
      On the men’s side, the Iowa State Cyclones are like a runaway freight train, mowing down their opponents with Big 12 Tourney wins over Kansas State, Baylor and number one Houston. They opened tournament play with a 82-65 win over South Dakota State and a 67-56 win over Washington State to advance to the Sweet 16.
      On the other side of the state, Iowa is out of the NIT and ready to regroup for next year. And Oklahoma, my favorite team, declined an invitation to the NIT after being the first team out of the big dance. All I can say is that the Sooners should have accepted the invitation and moved forward in life. In my thoughts, it’s about the game, not being left out.
      Kansas is out after a tough season and Kentucky, Florida and so many other good teams have bit the dust this year. I love to watch the no names take a bite out of the big boys.
      And don’t forget to toss in Oklahoma softball, our favorite team, and their games against Baylor. It has been a weekend and more of sports craziness.
      This is the best time of the year for watching sports from NASCAR to golf and professional baseball, which gets underway soon.
      As for Debbie and I, we love to watch the Sooners play softball. They currently hold a 31-1 record this season and are three-time national champions.
     The Sooners fell in early March to a tough University of Louisiana at Lafayette Ragin’ Cajuns softball team in their new stadium, Love’s Field, to end the team’s 71-game winning streak. The Sooners didn’t let the loss bother them as they have bounced back and heading into the next round of games at Kansas, hold a 13-game win streak and are perfect in the Big 12 conference.
      Last year, Debbie and I got to see the Sooners in Ames play against the ISU Cyclones. The stadium was packed and broke attendance records for two straight days. That was the fourth time we’ve seen the Sooners in Ames. I even got coach Patty Gasso’s autograph one year.
      I have been a Sooner football fan since I was in high school in the late 70s and a basketball fan since the days of Billy Tubbs in the 80s. I will never forget the national championship basketball game in 1988 between the Sooners and Kansas. The Sooners had won against Kansas twice in the regular season, but in the championship game, it was all Kansas and Danny Manning. They took it to the Sooners.
      When watching a Sooner football game, I’ve been known to pace about, talk to myself and talk to the television. I’ve watched some great Texas vs OU games in the Red River Rivalry and back in the day, there was nothing much better than the Sooners and the Cornhuskers going head-to-head in Norman and Lincoln.
      I remember one game when OU traveled to Lincoln. All the Husker kicker had to do was kick a field goal and Nebraska would win. He kicked the ball and hit the goalpost and the Sooners won. Another time, the Sooners, down seven points, scored 10 unanswered points in the last two minutes of a game to win 20-17.
        Enjoy the games and take time to breath and on occasion say hello to your family.
        Have a great week and always remember that “Good Things are Happening,” every day.