Parity beckons

The Blob has yapped enough the last few days about the particularly mad Madness of this year's men's March Madness. It's high time, in the interests of the equity the NCAA shuns, to look in on the women's March Madness.

(Yes, I know. The NCAA has forbade the women from using the lucrative March Madness brand. Screw them. This is my Blob and I make the rules, and my rules say the women's tournament shall be called March Madness, too.)

In any event, something interesting and fairly significant is happening on the women's side.

Once upon time there was Connecticut and there was Tennessee and there were Baylor, Stanford, South Carolina, Notre Dame and the Texases, the University and A&M. Iowa and Purdue, sure. Duke and North Carolina a bit later.

Everyone else?

Everyone else was kibble.

A lower seed, back in the day, had about as much chance against one of the top four or five seeds as a stalk of wheat has against a combine. The women's tournament was a second-grade classroom: Big kids towering over little kids, and miles and miles of chalk.

But something wonderful is happening these days.

Parity has entered the building.

Twelves are beating 5s. Elevens are beating 6s. A 13 beat a 4 the other day, and last night, a 2-seed (Texas A&M) had to go overtime against a 7-seed (17-11 Iowa State) and survived by two to reach the Sweet Sixteen.

Conclusion: The women's side is starting look more and more like the men's side every day. Except for, you know, the branding and the amenities and the facilities and that sort of thing, which are still low-rent and still convey the NCAA's unspoken sentiment: You girls get back down in steerage where you belong.

That said, when a 13-seed like Wright State knocks off a 4-seed like Arkansas in the first round, that's a good thing. When a 12-seed Belmont beats 5-seed Gonzaga, that's a good thing, too. Or an 11 like BYU knocking out a 6 like Rutgers.

All of that means the women's game has more quality players than ever before, and not all of them are winding up at UConn. And that means the women's game is growing the way a sport should grow, from the grassroots up.

More elementary girls playing basketball leads to more middle school girls playing basketball leads to more high school girls playing basketball -- and more to the point, more highly skilled high school girls playing basketball.

The NCAA can treat the women's game like a nuisance all it likes. It's still getting better anyway.

And, yes, it's March Madness, too. No matter what a bunch of withered old white guys say.