Glorious craziness

 I think I know what redeems college buckets these days, with a new season punching the start key. You do, too, I bet.

Florida Atlantic in the Final Four redeems college buckets.

Fairleigh Dickinson shocking Purdue does. (Sorry, Boiler fans)

Every Bucknell, Mercer, UMBC, George Mason, Directional State Tech who's ever knocked a blueblood on its collective ass does.

Little guys rising up to give big guys what-for is the most appealing thing about the college game these days, partly because the college game is such a professional enterprise anymore. And with all the inherent cash-driven injustices that come with that.

Assistant coaches and sneaker salesmen lose their jobs or go off to prison while the  marquee names who funnel cash into the Professional Enterprise walk (Hello, Bill Self). It's not fair, but, as Scrooge famously put it, it's business. It's the status quo, status quo-ing.

That's why it's heartening to see the status quo may not be what it used to be.

See what happened the first two nights of the new season, for instance?

One of those president schools, James Madison, went to East Lansing and took out the No. 4 Michigan State Spartans in overtime.

Purdue-Fort Wayne, which lost a ton from last year's team, went up to DePaul and beat its supposed Big East betters by eight.

A Florida Gulf Coast team that finished 17-11 last year and was missing its best player went to Bloomington and scared the cream-and-crimson out of Indiana before losing by six.

(Quickie analysis of the latter: Hoosiers have players but they don't have a team yet. Will take Mike Woodson awhile to sort through the pieces and figure out where they all fit, but when he does, Indiana will be fine. Maybe more than fine)

The conclusion you can draw from all this is everyone has guys who can play now, not just the usual suspects. The transfer portal and chunky NIL deals have erased the old landscape and reconfigured it, and while some may bemoan that -- blame the NCAA for basically just saying "Do whatever you want" --  it's demonstrably going to make college buckets more entertaining

Craziness is glorious, after all. Especially in this game, and especially in March, which figures to be absolutely, wonderfully nutso from here on out.

Bring it on.