by Thea Platt

March in Vermont is a veritable season full of ups and downs. Sugaring, an up, muddy roads, a definite down.

March also brings a sport to our attention, like it or not - basketball.

Now I'm an alumni, sort of, of a small Midwestern college that no one ever heard of in the east with its Ivy League, upper crust schools. Basketball was big at our school and I was thrust into the game not by sneakers but by the glockenspiel. Yes, I was in the college band and we always played at the football and basketball games. (Do you know how much a wrong note can echo in a field house? I do.) Basketball was key at school because all the local high schools would play tournament brackets similar to the NCAA's - small schools and large ones culminating in the trip to the field house in the middle of our college campus.

Crazy high school kids would come honking into campus, streamers flowing, painted faces eager to cheer on their school to victory. This added excitement to the college atmosphere and our college team would sometimes beat the big guns of the state. We would act just as crazy as the high schoolers but, of course, more sophisticated.

March Madness arrived and by some miracle our school ended up being in with the 63 other teams with a dream of advancing. We'd been there a couple of times before even making it to the Sweet Sixteen once, I believe, but not in my memory.

All is changed. You guessed it - I went to Butler University!! It is my school and we are on a high now. Who wouldn't be? Final Four - does that sound sweet or what? Everything stops the minute I hear the announcer say something about Butler.

And it brings back memories of playing in that field house - home of "Hoosiers," the movie about those crazy high school kids honking through the campus. It's been 40 years since playing the glockenspiel in that field house but the memories flood back.

So I'm proud to say I went to Butler and you can bet on what I'll be doing next Saturday at 6 p.m. Butler proves anyone can do it and I'm in for the ride.

Thea Platt, class of ‘66 sort of, went on to Indiana University to get my Physical Therapy degree but my heart was always five miles north on the bus line to the Fairview campus.