Over the last couple weeks, BYU womens basketball fans have gone from the disappointment and disgust of not making the NCAA tournament to the electric excitement of making the Final Four of the WBIT. BYU is the overall number one seed, and they have lived up to it by beating their three opponents by an average of 19.3 points.
Now, let's take a look at the other three teams in the Final Four. First, we've got the 4th-seeded Columbia Lions, the 23-8 Ivy League champions from New York City, and I had to look up every single one of those details. (Although, they did hold St John's, a middle of the pack Big East team, to 26 points, so you can't take them too lightly.) Then, we've got the 16-17 Wisconsin Badgers, who finished 15th place in the Big 10 with a 5-13 conference record, which was good enough to earn them a 3 seed in the second best tournament in womens college basketball because... um... that's college basketball. And then there's the 2nd-seeded Kansas Jayhawks, who finished 22-13 and 8-10 in the most underrated conference in womens college basketball and is 5-0 against BYU since the Cougars joined the Big 12, including an 81-60 thrashing a couple months ago..
And so naturally, BYU, who the overall number 1 seed in this tournament, is being rewarded by getting to play... 2nd-seeded Kansas... in Kansas.
The 3 seed is playing the 4 seed, and the 1 seed is playing the 2 seed in what is basically a home game for the 2 seed. Yeah, OK. That makes sense.
Remember the good ol' days in the Mountain West Conference where the tournament was always held on UNLV's home court, and we lost to them as the higher seed three times in our last five seasons including twice in the championship? This feels like that all over again.
However, you want to know what the worst part of all this is? There's no one to blame. I mean, what's the WBIT committee supposed to do? Automatically match the highest seed with the lowest seed in the final 4? No, that wouldn't work because it would lead to controversy if two teams with the same seed made it. Let the highest seed host the Final Four? No, because two teams could be tied for the highest seed, and plus, you don't want to risk having it in a high school gym in the middle of nowhere. (I'm pretty sure the reason the MWC didn't do this was because they didn't want to have the tournament in Laramie, as if Wyoming ever had a chance of making that happen.) Just play it by ear and do whatever makes sense? No, because that gives way to bias, and no matter what you decide, it will feel unfair to someone.
This is one of those times where it's just tough luck and you have to accept it. Life is just unfair sometimes, and there isn't always a completely fair solution that will make everyone happy. This doesn't mean we can't acknowledge tough breaks and laugh about them, but we just have to do the best we can with the things we have control over. For BYU, this means just playing their best basketball. Instead of having to beat Wisconsin or Columbia on Monday and then Kansas on Wednesday, they'll just have to beat Kansas on Monday and Wisconsin or Columbia on Wednesday. At the end of the day, if there is a team that clearly deserves to win the tournament, they will.