A. B. D.

There ought to be all new fresh faces in the Final Four this year. I watched with glee as West Virginia beat Kentucky. I agonized over Kansas State's loss to Butler, but you knew it was coming when K-State had to go to double-overtime to barely beat Xavier.

The game on television right now is Tennessee vs. Michigan State. Who will win? Who cares? Tennessee would be the sentimental favorite, overcoming a longer drought.

But please, please, please let the Baptists beat the Evil Ones. I'm a huge fan of the Big XII Conference, having grown up in the old Southwest Conference. My alma mater, Rice University, a former Southwest Conference member, is a baseball powerhouse, but lives in the basketball poorhouse. Big XII basketball is the next best thing and, with my other teams out, I'm rooting for Baylor.

Baylor University is less than two hours south of here. It's a team so hungry and has overcome a difficult past. Many of my husband's former students and other kids we know are at Baylor. And Baylor's No. 41, an agile, graceful giant, reminds me of my childhood hero - No. 6 Bill Russell of the Boston Celtics.

(Did you know that Bill Russell, one of the greatest to ever play the game, only played one year of high school basketball? The basketball coach recruited him from the track team because he was tall. A college scout happened to see the one decent performance he had in high school and he received a basketball scholarship to the University of San Francisco. The rest is history. I know all this because I read his biography, and all things Bill Russell, while in junior high.)

It's not long until tip-off.

Anybody

But

Duke !