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The regular college basketball season is over. We're still about a week away from the start of the NCAA Basketball Championship. Last year during this interlude, some 60 D-1 coaches lost their jobs. Already this year about a dozen coaches have been fired. It's bloodletting season, my favorite time of year. Just the other day, Indiana State coach Royce Waltman was let go after ten seasons, during which he compiled a 134-164 record numbers that hide the fact that he took over a moribund team and led it to consecutive NCAA Championship appearances in 1999-2000 and 2000-01. Waltman, whose Sycamores finished 12-17 this season (5-13 in the Missouri Valley Conference), was typically gracious in his remarks. "The administration handled this with the deft touch of a 20-mule team," he told reporters, acknowledging it's unlikely another school will hire him. "If you get fired for cheating you can get hired right back. If you get fired for losing, it's like leprosy." Coaches at Colorado, Utah, Illinois State and New Mexico, among others, were also shown the door. But the unseating at Harvard was the one that caught my ghoulish eye. Technically, the university did not fire Frank Sullivan, its basketball coach of 16 seasons. It chose not to renew his contract, following a 12-16 campaign, including 5-9 in the Ivy League fairly typical during his 178-245 reign. In a posting on the Harvard athletics Web site, athletic director Bob Scalise explained, "I am hopeful that a change in leadership of our men's basketball program will bring us closer to our goals of consistently contending for the Ivy League championship and achieving excellence in all aspects of the program." Our goals of consistently contending for the Ivy League championship? Before Sullivan took over, Harvard hadn't had a winning season in seven years. The last time the team qualified for the NCAA Championship was 11 U.S. presidents ago, in 1946. Just last season, Sullivan led the Crimson to a 5-0 start, earning the team a Top 25 ranking for the first time in school history. Why now? Who's to say for sure? According to sophomore forward Evan K. Harris, the team has clear hopes for Sullivan's replacement. "We want someone who we feel comfortable enough to talk to, that is more a friend than a coach," he told the school newspaper, The Harvard Crimson. Hmmm. A winner who's a buddy. A guy who, if you subscribe to T-Mobile, you'd include in your myFaves 5. Well, Bob Knight is out. So is Coach K. Maybe Harvard can convince Lute Olson to jump ship from Arizona, where, after all these years, he is almost certainly bored. Fun guy? You bet. Perhaps you remember him in "Naked Gun 33 1/3: The Final Insult," where he did a star turn pretending to be Phil Donahue. You can catch Olson and Arizona in the first round of the NCAA Championship, though with the seedings not set, yet, it's uncertain who or where they'll play. But it will be at one of these eight sites: • March 15 at Buffalo's HSBC Arena (1 Seymour H. Knox III Plaza, Web site). The games are sold out. Consult StubHub! (Buy tickets.) • March 15 at Lexington, Ky.'s Rupp Arena (430 W. Vine St., Web site). The games are sold out. Consult StubHub! (Buy tickets.) • March 15 at Sacramento's ARCO Arena (1 Sports Parkway, Web site). The games are sold out. Consult StubHub! (Buy tickets.) • March 15 at Winston-Salem, N.C.'s Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum (2825 University Parkway, Web site). The games are sold out. Consult StubHub! (Buy tickets.) • March 16 at Chicago's United Center (1901 W. Madison St., Web site). The games are sold out. Consult StubHub! (Buy tickets.) • March 16 at Columbus, Ohio's Nationwide Arena (200 W. Nationwide Blvd., Web site). The games are sold out. Consult StubHub! (Buy tickets.) • March 16 at New Orleans's New Orleans Arena (1501 Girod St., Web site). (Buy tickets.) • March 16 at Spokane's Spokane Veterans Memorial Arena (720 W. Mallon Ave., Web site). The games are sold out. Consult StubHub! (Buy tickets.) Of course, as Scalise says, it still comes down to winning, "about achieving excellence in all aspects of the program." For Olson, the pressure might prove too much.  Buffalo links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight
Lexington, Ky. links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight Sacramento links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight Winston-Salem links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight Chicago links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight Columbus, Ohio links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight New Orleans links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight Spokane links: Plan Trip | Hotel | Flight
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