Due to unpopular demand, we are holding one-hour Chat Blocks every day this week. Here's the schedule (all times EDT): Monday at 3 pm, Tuesday at 2 pm, Wednesday at 1 pm, Thursday at 5 pm and Friday at 5 pm.

Thursday's Chat Block will be at 6 pm EDT because of the spillover length of the RMU-Villanova game.

We do this every year around this time, and here again are the differences in athletic and basketball budgets between the teams in today's mid-versus-notso games. Our Red Line that separates those above and us here below is based on average athletic budgets, and teams in the Upper 8 beat the Other 24 a full 85 percent of the time.

So money is very important in this sport. Money is what makes conferences "power conferences," because money is power. Money is what lets programs retain their overachieving head coaches, travel the world recruiting the best players available, and build facilities that will help them compete. When the low seeds face off against the big boys today, remember what they're up against: cash, baby. All figures from the U.S. Department of Education.

 
[11] Old Dominion vs. [6] Notre Dame - 12:25 pm
South (Houston) Region - New Orleans, LA
Athletic ODU: $17,974,306 ND: $60,117,476 ($43m diff/28% of ND's)
Men's Basketball ODU: $2,229,772 ND: $3,908,815 ($1m diff/67% of ND's)

 
[15] Robert Morris vs. [2] Villanova - 12:30 pm
South (Houston) Region - Providence, RI
Athletic RMU: $10,647,726 NOVA: $23,925,128 ($13m diff/43% of NOVA's)
Men's Basketball RMU: $1,167,353 NOVA: $4,930,726 ($3m diff/25% of NOVA's)

 
[13] Murray State vs. [4] Vanderbilt - 2:30 pm
West (Salt Lake City) Region - San Jose, CA
Athletic MURR: $11,176,152 VAND: $45,521,856 ($34m diff/24% of VAND's)
Men's Basketball MURR: $1,302,125 VAND: $7,495,815 ($6m diff/14% of VAND's)

It's the Wednesday before the Thursday of the Tournament, a day for hopes and dreams and wishes. Today, we're all still believing that the impossible will become possible. Every time we play the games in our heads, those teen seeds from one-bid leagues always seem to find a way to pull out wins in the end. This is a day for "well, if this happens, and that happens, and we stay out of foul trouble, then mayybe..."

As you probably know, Beth Ann Cosgrave and I wrote a book about this very day! We did it with the help of some friends, too. It's called Bally's Dream, and we'd like to dedicate it to Arkansas-Pine Bluff, Vermont, Lehigh and East Tennessee State, the No. 16 seeds who will be attempting to make history over the next two days.

Click on the pages to turn them!

And it's available for purchase! (Buying a copy helps kids, too.) We are sold out of our first run of the paperback, but another big box was ordered today. (In other words, please allow 1-2 weeks for delivery.) I've been getting messages about paperbacks arriving in happy places all across Hoops Nation, but my apologies to anyone who didn't receive it yet. It's coming, it's coming!

I just got word last night that the hardcover, on the other hand, was held up at the printer. It will be another 1-2 weeks for those to be delivered, but by that time the Tournament (or at least Season 6) will be over. So if you preordered, please watch your e-mail box for a list of options. We will make it right, and I humbly apologize for an unforseen mixup that was, ultimately, out of our control.

An important order of business! Dina S. from Charlotte won the drawing among preorderers for Bally No. 99. Congratulations, Dina! Your new orange friend will be along soon, yes!

To all, please enjoy this anticipatory day to the fullest... the feeling won't last forever. The next few days will be full of heartbreak, unmet expectations and missed chances -- but with a few moments of victory mixed in to remind us all of the possibilities. Right now, though, all 25 Tournament dreams are alive, and each team has a chance.

Due to unpopular demand, we are holding one-hour Chat Blocks every day this week. Here's the schedule (all times EDT): Monday at 3 pm, Tuesday at 2 pm, Wednesday at 1 pm, Thursday and Friday at 5 pm.

And don't forget about our bracket contest!

DAYTON, Ohio -- Just the word "playoffs" tightens heart muscles, bates breaths, causes sleepless and nervous palpitations. Fans can't wait for the fun to begin. In the professional ranks of American-Style Football, "wild card weekend" is the start of a month of lost weekends. ALDS and NLCS and conference quarterfinals... this is the terminology of anticipation.

At the NCAA Tournament, not so much. Because of the airport handshakes that split the Mountain West from the WAC a decade ago, the first day of the Big Dance is not Thursday but Tuesday. There's an extra game necessary to break 65 down to 64, and this is the true first day of the playoffs. This Play-In Game, this P.I.G., is supposed to be an explosion of excitement, the first day of March Madness, the kickoff of the fourth and final chapter of our beautiful season.

"Be honest with me," I said to University of Dayton SID Doug Hauschild, who oversees media at the 10-year-old event. "Other than the locals, and the folks from Winthrop and Arkansas-Pine Bluff, how many out-of-town journalists are here today?"

"There's an AP radio guy from Cincinnati, I don't know if you'd count him," Doug replied. "But really, you're it."

So I feel a strong obligation to share the story of Arkansas-Pine Bluff's historic and groundbreaking NCAA win over Winthrop, because, apparently, no other faraway media felt this game was important enough to make the trip to watch it.