It was pretty interesting to bounce around the bowels of the Garden yesterday, soaking all of the media experience in and seeing how exciting (and at the same time boring) the first day of the Big East tournament can be. I’ve got plenty of pictures on the other side, so take a peek.

Before I get to the pics (and I’ve got plenty more, but it’s getting late and I’m trying to get at least five hours of sleep per night in March), I should mention that I finally spoke to Luke Winn (of SI.com). He’s a pretty chill guy. Lucky dude’s bouncing around the country to hit up each and every round of The Tournament and live blog it all. (If we could all only be so lucky.) In fact, he asked me, “Are you going to be going out to any of the sites?”

I chuckled. No, sorry Luke, but the CHJ budget can’t quite swing that yet! But be sure to check out his stuff throughout this month as he experiences live what we’ll watch on the tube.

I’m hoping to hop to the Garden again tomorrow, but we’ll see how getting tickets goes. Here’s a slice of what I saw yesterday.

I could smell the sweat. Not so good. The guy on the left seemed OK with allowing me to hover over him while I took three of these kinds of pics.

I asked Harris to turn and smile, but shortly after this shot was taken he gave me an odd look. What a weirdo.

I think there was talk of “shocking,” “worlds,” “they don’t know” and “let’s do this” while Villanova got their pregame mojo going.

It looked like ‘Nova was ready to surrender…

…then they started draining treys.

Gotta love the “We just got fouled, so let’s talk it over” routine that most college clubs do.

Just a good action shot here…

… but this is my best one. Especially impressive given the fact that my digital camera reacts about seven seconds after I ACTUALLY PUSH THE FRIGGIN’ BUTTON. I failed on about 13 layup/dunk shots before I got this one.

I moved to the actual press table on the floor for the WVU-Provy game. I saw a lot of rear. I’ll stop there.

Just a note: the ball went out of bounds before this play and I threw it back to the ref. I threw it to the other side of the court. Okay, that’s a lie. The second part, I mean.

The Friar. What a terrible mascot. I couldn’t bear to show you the face on this thing. I think Lee Corso might’ve been hiding inside.

No, I wasn’t completely spoiled. At some point, I had to join some buddies up in the higher tiers. Often times, you can appreciate it that much more.

I actually was in this same position a few years back, and there were boom mics that were around in order to have your questions heard. This time, there were no mics, so I only sat in on the ‘Nova-’Cuse postgame presser. I think the guy in maroon had it out for me yesterday, but he sure did love his popcorn.

Late in the night. Things got slow. E-X-C-I-T-I-N-G.

So that’s some of it. I gotta thank Andy Bazos, who will probably never read this site, but he helped the whole thing come about yesterday, so I do owe him more than just some gratitude. (Yes, mother, I thank you as well, but next time don’t insist that I raise my damn arm and wave when I’m sitting at the press tables and am on national television.)

Hoop-wise, one thing I did learn: I will absolutely not pick either West Virginia to win a single game, nor Pitt two win two in March. Of course, this will inevitably break my bracket to shambles.

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