Big Dance

Here is a list of the products of Public, Catholic and Inter-Ac schools whose teams are competing in the NCAA Basketball Tournament: Cameron Ayers, Bucknell 6-4, G, Freshman Germantown Academy This all-rookie honoree has made no starts in 33 games for the Patriot kingpins, but he's averaging 23 minutes of action and 7.6 points. Also second on the team in steals (26), and he's deadly at the line (48-for-55, 87 percent). Second-team All-City pick in 2010. Sean Evans, St. John's 6-8, F, Senior Northeast Averaging 11.9 minutes, 3.6 points and 2.6 rebounds as a key frontcourt sub. His floor percentage (.507)

The hours between now and 6 p.m. are going to feel endless today for Villanova fans eager to find out the NCAA fate of their Wildcats. The NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Committee has been deliberating since Wednesday in Indianapolis to try to come up with the 34 best at-large teams to join the 31 schools with automatic bids. The dilemma for the committee is that there are maybe 40 to 45 teams that can say they are among those 34 best. The Wildcats, a Big East member with a 20-12 record, certainly have a claim to a fourth straight NCAA appearance, but it's far from a done deal that they will see their name on the board tonight.

In Louisville, Ky., Justin Burdine scored 24 points, including a jumper in the lane with 9.1 seconds left that gave Murray State the lead, and the Racers (19-12) beat Tennessee Tech, 70-69, to win the Ohio Valley Conference tournament and their 12th NCAA tournament bid. Tennessee Tech (24-6), seeking its first NCAA tournament appearance since 1963, had two final chances to win. Cameron Crisp missed an off-balance three-pointer, and Damien Kinloch's follow shot bounced off the rim as the buzzer sounded.

Ten college basketball teams convene today in New York to begin a four-day contest for a prize of dubious value. For three straight years, when the champion of the Big East Conference tournament has progressed to the next level, the NCAA tournament promptly has spit it back out. Two of the previous winners exited in the second round, and last year's champ, Providence College, took just one spin in the Big Dance. By contrast, Boston College, the conference's last survivor in the 1994 NCAA tournament, went from a 23-point loss to Georgetown in the quarterfinals at Madison Square Garden to the Elite Eight of the national tourney.

Forget spring cleaning, you had all winter to do that (thanks to El Nino). Spring training? Those guys play 162 games during the season. Who has interest in the 30 Grapefruit games? This is the time of year for one sport and one sport only. College basketball, March Madness. So while you're placing your bets and counting your wins and losses in your office pool, keep an eye on some South Jersey players who are competing in the Big Dance. The story of college basketball this season has to be the Princeton Tigers.

The Big Five yesterday enjoyed its best NCAA Selection Sunday since 1989, the year every women's team except Penn had a ticket to the Big Dance. A trio of schools - Temple, Penn and Villanova - had the pleasure of hearing their names announced on ESPN when the 64-team draw was made known late in the afternoon. Additionally, Penn State and Rutgers, both frequent visitors to the NCAA tournament, also were back in the field. The Nittany Lions received a No. 1 seed and were placed in the East.

There was light applause when Bob Knight walked out on the floor last night for a news conference at the United Center. No boos or catcalls. Some guy yelled, "You the man. " Back in Big Ten country and at the NCAA tournament after that little one-year sabbatical that resulted from his firing at Indiana, Knight proved that changing sweaters didn't change him. Sixth-seeded Texas Tech (23-8), which will play No. 11 seed Southern Illinois (26-7) tonight in the first round of the NCAA East Regional, has yet to achieve anything that Knight's Indiana teams didn't routinely accomplish.

Lizbelle Espada seems almost hypnotized. She strikes a pose, raising her hands to frame her face. She pouts. Three seconds later, she bends forward, one leg held in the air behind her, her other hand arched to the ceiling. Her head tilts back. A few seconds more, another new posture as through the speakers, Madonna beseeches her: Vogue. Vogue. Vogue. Espada is not a fashion model. But she vamps like one, at the request of Madonna, the video vixen of our time. With the first single from her I'm Breathless album, "Vogue," holding the No. 1 spot on Billboard pop charts for the last three weeks, and with an artsy video that demonstrates the art of vogueing, Madonna has succeeded in popularizing the posturing dance, which had been an aging underground phenomenon.

After every high school basketball season at Strawberry Mansion, boys' coach Gerald Hendricks kicks back and enjoys the game he loves from the comfort of his living room, watching the NCAA tournament on TV. This year, he had three times the incentive to watch. Hendricks, who has won two Public League championships at Strawberry Mansion, has three former players in the Big Dance: Tracey Worley of Delaware State, Maureece Rice of George Washington, and Omar Thomas of Texas-El Paso.

Shanine Jackson, 18, had never been to a prom before - she dropped out of high school before dance time rolled around. Louis Ortiz, 19, also missed his prom. "I was always getting teased for being Hispanic, and for being gay. So I dropped out. " And Evette Pe na, 22, went to her prom - alone. "I refused to take a man," she said, smiling beneath her top hat. On Friday night, Shanine and Louis and Evette, and about 70 others in their late teens and early 20s, got another chance, at Philadelphia's first-ever Alternative Prom in the ballroom of the Warwick Hotel, where the lights were low and the bass was booming and no one stared or pointed or whispered or told you that you'd burn in hell because you danced with a same-sex partner.

DAYTON, Ohio - Every pass is a risk. Every basket is an accomplishment. The scoreboard doesn't change very much and may not make it up to 50 until late in the game. South Florida is bringing its own brand of ugliness to the NCAA tournament. The Bulls (20-13) got to the First Four because of their ability to make a basket the ultimate challenge. They set a Big East record by allowing only 56.9 points per game this season, reducing high-flying offenses to 40 minutes of futility.

The NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Committee has done its seeding, scrubbing, bracketing, and pairing for this year's Big Dance, and now it's time for all good men and women to take up their brackets. There are any number of ways to pick brackets - using the latest information on the Internet, or because you like the colors of the team's uniforms or you had a good meal when you drove through their town three years ago or because Digger Phelps talked so highly about their opponent that you just wanted to pick against him. I'm usually the kind of bracket chooser who must weigh every matchup thoroughly before I fill in the line and usually doesn't get his bracket in until a few hours before the first tip. So imagine my horror when my editor told me he wanted me to choose my bracket right after the matchups were revealed so as to get them into your morning newspaper the following day?

Boys' Latin put two straight defeats - and three years of state-playoff frustration - behind it on Friday night. Coming off losses in the Public League final and District 12 championship, the Warriors gained their first PIAA Class AAA state victory in four tries with a 70-49 romp over undermanned Pope John Paul II at Southern High. Maurice Watson (23 points), Carlos Taylor (20), and Yahmir Greenlee (15) sparked the historic victory. "We beat them with our speed, fast-break points, and defense," said Greenlee, a 5-foot-9, 150-pound junior point guard.

ALL DREXEL CAN do this weekend is root for the chalks to win out. It's getting crowded in Bubbleville and the Dragons don't need any more company from midlevel teams making a late run. Some of those schools will start today as six more conferences begin postseason tournaments. Among the teams Drexel needs to lose early are North Carolina State, Northwestern, Tennessee and Colorado State. On the opposite end, the Dragons need Nevada to win the WAC. There are all forms of madness this time of year.

The rivalry between Kansas and Missouri dates to the 1850s and had nothing to do with basketball. The battle over slavery was the foundation for the early ugliness and the animosity never dissipated. Instead, it has carried over into athletics. It also is why many hoops traditionalists are hoping for a Missouri-Kansas Big 12 championship game; one more Border War before Missouri heads to the SEC. Here is a look at the five leagues starting conference tournaments today: Big 12 Regular-season champ: Kansas, ranked 13th in the preseason, is the biggest surprise among the likely No. 1 seeds for the NCAAs.

RICHMOND, Va. - Samme Givens, Drexel's undersize rebounding leader, was moving slowly after the Dragons beat Old Dominion soundly on Sunday to earn a spot in the Colonial Athletic Association championship game. Givens hopes that his team is on the way to someplace very special, but at that moment he was merely on the way to the locker room and limping as he went. "Well," coach Bruiser Flint said flatly as he watched Givens heading down the hallway, "it was a tough game. " Which is just another way of saying it was a CAA game.

March Madness is approaching - the dramatic conclusion to what has been an interesting season in college basketball. How could anybody have forecast in November that Villanova would be the city's biggest long shot for earning an NCAA bid? To get a further look at the chances of the area teams, we talked to Joe Lunardi, who put the word bracketologist into the hoops lexicon. Lunardi is ESPN's forecaster as it regards who will make the NCAA tournament. Here is a look at the local teams, with comments by Lunardi about their chances.

1. Bubbling up There are only four weeks to go before Selection Sunday and the NCAA tournament bubble is getting quite crowded. Our favorite bracketeers, Joe Lunardi of ESPN.com and Jerry Palm of CollegeRPI.com, provided fresh conjecture on selections Friday, and both have Minnesota and North Carolina State among their last four teams in. But they differ on Miami and Northwestern (Lunardi both out, Palm both in) and on Texas (Lunardi in, Palm out). Other teams that shouldn't make hotel reservations just yet are Colorado State and Washington.

Aimee Teegarden and Thomas McDonell play two very different high-school students who have to come together to save the school's big dance in the new Disney film "Prom. " For Teegarden, best known for her work on "Friday Night Lights," the film is part of her plan to move into acting in and producing movies. This is the first leading role for McDonell, who will next appear in Tim Burton's "Dark Shadows. " We asked Teegarden and McDonell a few questions about on-screen chemistry, careers and high-school dances.