Syracuse Coach Jim Boeheim says let this first nip-and-tuck weekend of the NCAA tournament be a lesson to us all.
"The problem with college basketball is there's not a big gap," Boeheim explained Sunday of the relative talent levels of the majors and mid-majors. "Everyone wants to make it seem like it's a big gap. It's not a big gap."
Wait an upper-state New York minute.
Syracuse won its first two tournament games by 23 and 22 points — that's the Cumberland Gap.
Boeheim must be talking about everybody else — his team looks unstoppable — but we're hip to his general point.
There's all this teeth-gnashing before the tournament about seeding positions, and which conference is best and worst. And a lot of it ends up being Arkansas hogwash.
On any given day, reputation, tradition, dreams and games can be taken.
The Big East, which earned eight NCAA bids, has one more team in the Sweet 16 than the Ivy League.
People said Washington, without winning the Pac-10 tournament, didn't belong.
Washington is four victories from winning the national title.
St. Mary's got left behind last year after going 28-7 in the West Coast (a two-bit conference, never two bids). Gonzaga is the only WCC school anyone knows.
St. Mary's got in this year as a No. 10 and is in the round of 16, fresh off an upset win over a 2009 Final Four team, Villanova.
Gonzaga, on Sunday, missed 21 three-point shots in a blowout loss to Syracuse.
Kansas earned the overall No. 1 seeding and received the most favorable funneling to the Final Four (via Oklahoma City and St. Louis).
It turns out the Jayhawks will be very well-rested from here on out because they're sleeping in their own beds after being ousted by Northern Iowa.
Top-seeded Kentucky, a collegiate powerhouse which had won 97 tournament games entering this one, has to get on a plane for next week's East Regional semifinals in Syracuse.
Cornell, which had never won a tournament game until Friday, gets to take the bus and enjoy home-cooking advantage in the most anticipated matchup of regional weekend.
Kentucky vs. Cornell . . . can you believe it?
It's the battle of Blue Grass vs. Gray Matter.
Kentucky-Cornell is the kind of serendipitous happenstance that makes the NCAA tournament so uniquely unique.
"This is different from football," Boeheim said. "We find out in this tournament who the best teams really are."
Yes and no.
