The Final Four

Bill Simmons says that this upcoming Final Four this weekend might be one of the best ever. He writes,

We'll always remember that UNC-Georgetown game from 1982 not just because of the last 30 seconds, but because Patrick Ewing, Sleepy Floyd, Sam Perkins, James Worthy AND Michael Jordan were involved. Maybe there wasn't as much star power in the 2007 rematch, but Jeff Green, Roy Hibbert, Ty Lawson and Brandan Wright could end up being top-12 picks three months from now; Tyler Hansbrough should crack the top 20; and we're not even mentioning Wayne Ellington (one year away from being a prime-time player) or the three Georgetown perimeter guys (Sapp, Wallace and Summers) who shot a combined 19-for-30 on Sunday. With the exception of Wright (who probably would have entered last year's NBA draft under the old rules), that's just good fortune to have so many quality players in the same Elite Eight game. And over everything else, that's why you'll be flicking channels 35 years from now and stumbling across that game on ESPN Classic. You know, assuming it's one of the three days of the year they aren't showing a 24-hour poker marathon. Anyway, with two No. 1 seeds and two No. 2 seeds staying alive in a loaded college basketball season, we're headed for the most exciting Final Four since '99 with UConn (Rip Hamilton, Jake Voskuhl and Khalid El-Amin), Duke (Shane Battier, Corey Maggette, Elton Brand, Trajan Langdon), Ohio State (Scoonie Penn and Michael Redd) and Michigan State (Mateen Cleaves and Mo Peterson). From a talent standpoint, there's no comparison between then and now: This year's quartet features a future No. 1 pick and franchise center (Oden), six future lottery picks (Oden, Conley, Noah, Horford, Brewer, Green and Hibbert), two more potential first rounders (Afflalo and Collison), two elite college players with a knack for coming up big when it matters (Georgetown's Wallace and OSU's Ron Lewis), three superb coaches (Thompson, Florida's Billy Donovan and UCLA's Ben Howland, who pulled Bill Self's pants down on Saturday) and quality point guards on all four teams. You'd have to travel back to '93 (when three No. 1 seeds and a No. 2 seed made it, including Michigan's Fab Five team) to find this much talent and this many subplots in the Final Four.

All I know is this: Saturday's games (Florida-UCLA and OSU-Georgetown) are appointment viewing for anyone who ever gave a crap about basketball. When's the last time you could say something like that about the Final Four? I'm giddy.