Logic has nothing to do with rooting for my teams

I became almost physically ill yesterday afternoon, all due to a single basketball game. My beloved Hawkeyes had laid an egg in the first round of the NCAA men's tournament after an unexpectedly fun and fulfilling regular season and Big Ten tournament championship.

The team had been expected to come in near the bottom of the conference, mostly due to four starters from 2020-21 leaving (two to the NBA and two transferring). But Keegan Murray played like a star and the team featured at least ten accomplished players, each of whom could bring something to the game. 

Then came the tournament and the high expectations that Iowa might make it to the Final Four -- wow! -- and I have been a Hawk fan long enough to know that such high hopes are similar to a character in a movie saying something like, "Man, things are going so great for me these days. I don't see any problems in my future."

Yeah, we know this is a heads up that things are soon NOT going to be so great and that major problems are about to arrive.

So I should have been prepared for inevitable disappointment, but here's the thing: I was not. Even after nearly seven decades of rooting for Iowa and all the disappointments and upsets and simple bad luck, I disregarded history and went all in. 

There was the familiar bad luck in the game, with shots that normally fall for Iowa clanking or circling the rim and falling out. There were some terrible calls by the officials, though that is true in every basketball game, and some came right at the end, with a tight game, so they seemed more significant. And the team just never seemed to demonstrate the energy and toughness and confidence it had developed in the previous month or so.

It was just a game, and not all that notable since upsets are precisely the reason the tournament is called March Madness. 

I am calmer today and looking forward to watching the Iowa women play their first NCAA tournament game. That team also caught fire in the last month or so of the season and won the Big Ten tournament. The team features Caitlin Clark, certainly the most dynamic women's player in the country.

In my head, I know that the Iowa women will likely not advance to the Final Four -- the top-rated team in the nation lies in their way -- but my heart whispers, "Why not Iowa?"

Disappointment looms, but I just can't turn away.