NCAA Tournament under way, thoughts on Utah coaching

The NCAA Tournament gets under way in full force starting tomorrow morning at around 10 a.m. MT. It will be televised on CBS, TBS, TNT and TruTV and is available to watch online at ncaa.com. I've filled out my bracket and starting at 10 a.m. MT tomorrow you can check it out. Let's just call it the winning bracket. You're welcome. My Final Four is Ohio State, Texas, Kansas and Pittsburgh, with Ohio State topping Kansas in the title game.

There is no other time of year quite like the NCAA Tournament, and the best part if you ask me is the first two full days with upsets, exciting finishes and the like. I like how everyone has a chance to win and to prove it on the floor which is not always the case with college football. It's a great time of year. I'll be tweeting updates throughout the day tomorrow and throughout the Tournament as well. I will attempt to do better with the blogging than I have the last week, especially since it is Spring Break for me at the University of Utah this coming week.

Speaking of the U., basketball coach Jim Boylen was dismissed last Saturday. It wasn't too big of a surprise. I feel bad for the guy, he was classy, passionate and poured his heart into the job. I would have liked to see what he would do with another year at the helm. However, I am anxious to see who Utah will hire as their next basketball coach. I was hoping for Billy Gillespie, but reports have surfaced that he has interviewed at Texas Tech. I think Utah is a better job than Tech, but it looks quite possible that Gillespie will take the job as head coach of the Red Raiders this week. I'm a big fan of Colorado State's Tim Miles who built the Rams into an MWC contender from nothing. However, I think it wouldn't hurt to try and go after some bigger names first.

espn.com's Andy Katz had this to say about the Utah job: "Utah is still a very good basketball job. Rick Majerus wasn't the first to prove this point and he won't be the last. The fan base is extremely passionate about the team, and as the football program has proved, it can compete at a high level for a sustained period." It made me happy to read that and see that someone from the national media recognizes what we are all about at Utah, in particular with our basketball program. It's been a rough week and a rough season, especially with the success of our biggest rival, so it was just something nice to read.