As Yogi Berra would say: “This is like deja vu all over again.”

The Florida Gators beat Ohio State for the NCAA Championship. Seems like we’ve heard that before somewhere. Oh, yea, less than three months ago the Gators beat the Buckeye’s to win the College Football Crown. Now, the same thing happened in the college basketball championship.

But this win, the Gators basketball win, means a lot more.

Why?

Well, for one thing, this is the second straight college basketball championship for the Gators. They convincingly proved they are the best college basketball team this year.

But, more significantly, the win places the Gators in the same class as some of the best college basketball teams ever. No one has won back-to-back college basketball championships since the Duke Blue Devils did it fifteen years ago.

Before that, you have to go back to the UCLA teams of the late 60’s and early 70’s.

I won’t argue that Florida is the best team ever. Maybe yes, maybe no. But, it should be acknowledged that winning consecutive championships is much tougher now then it was even 15 years ago.

Why?

There are two primary reasons. First, there is more parity in college basketball. Second, the best players are much more likely, today, to go pro before completing four years in college.

It’s impossible and unfair to compare teams from different eras, but the Gators should be part of any conversation about the best team ever.

But, the most significant thing about the Gators’ second basketball championship is it establishes the Southeastern (SEC) conference as the best college basketball conference.

Not only does the SEC have the best men’s basketball team in Florida. They also have the best women’s basketball team in the Tennessee Lady Volunteers.

The Lady Vols won the Women’s NCAA Championship in even more dominating fashion than the Gators won the men’s. And the Lady Vols have an even stronger claim to the argument that they are the best women’s basketball team ever.

In fact, truthfully, there is no argument about the Lady Vols. They are the dominant program in women’s basketball. Not just this year, but all-time. Their legendary coach, Pat Summitt has led the Lady Vols to the most NCAA titles (7); and 26 consecutive appearances in the Sweet 16. She has won a record 948 games. Amazing!

You want history? The SEC has that too. Kentucky has had a couple down years, but they still lead the nation with the most all-time college basketball victories (1949), winning percentage, NCAA Tournament bids and fan attendance. See Best all-time NCAA Basketball Record.

Until this week, I still ranked the ACC as the best overall basketball conference. In fact, I still haven’t updated my site to reflect the new realities. See SEC Basketball.

But the time has come to recognize the changing of the guard. College basketball is better and more competitive than ever. The ACC and Big East are both great basketball conferences with great histories. The Big Ten, Big-12 and Pac 10 are good too.

But history isn’t enough. In the past two years, the ACC has had 0 teams in the Final Four. The SEC has had three. If you look at the past two NCAA tournaments, the SEC has clearly been the top conference.

We know about Florida and the Tennessee Lady Vols. But, the conference is much deeper than that. In fact, over the past two years, the SEC has had the best March Madness record of any conference. That is for both the men’s and women’s NCAA tournaments.

This year, the SEC went 11-4 in the men’s tournament. And, two of the losses (Tennessee and Vanderbilt) were to higher ranked opponents (Ohio State and Georgetown) and the games were decided on last-minute, controversial, plays.

The SEC did even better in the women’s tournament, going 15-4. They had the most teams in the Sweet 16 (4); Great 8 (3); and, Final Four (2).

The time has come for the college basketball world to recognize the obvious. The SEC is not just the top football conference. Florida and Tennessee’s Championships have established the SEC as the top college basketball conference in America. And that is the big story to come out of March Madness 2007.

Henry Chadwick, called the father of baseball, its first Viagra buy writer and the inventor of the box score, claimed that American baseball was positively descended from the British game of rounders, which became “town ball” in this country, then baseball. He was an eyewitness to the evolution, having seen rounders played as a boy in England, and rounders, town ball and baseball in this country.

A. G. Spalding, founder of the famous sporting goods house, a fine pitcher himself, and publisher of the “Baseball Guide,” claimed that such a theory was nonsense and that baseball was purely an American invention. A committee was appointed to investigate the matter. The findings of the committee – that baseball had been invented in 1839 by Abner Doubleday, a distinguished Civil War General, in Cooperstown, New York – were based wholly upon evidence submitted in a letter written by a man who stated that he had observed the actual invention when he was a schoolboy in Cooperstown.

Many accepted the findings of the committee even though there seemed to be much more evidence to support Chadwick’s claim than that of Spalding. To this day, even though numerous baseball authorities have repeatedly poked holes in the Doubleday theory, there are many who still believe this old story. It should be noted that Abner Doubleday himself never made any claims whatever to having had any influence on baseball. He had died years before the findings were published.

By the early 1840s, the baseball games played in this country had been pretty well standardized into “Town Ball,” played East of New York, and “the New York Game,” played, naturally, in New York. They were alike in many respects but Town Ball was patterned more after the ancient rounders, while the New York Game seems to have been largely taken from cricket. In 1842, the New Yorkers drew up the first diagram of a baseball field and grown men began to take this boys’ game seriously and to see in it possibilities for a great sport.

In 1845, the Knickerbocker Baseball Club of New York was formed, the first such organization in history. It was an amateur group with duly elected officers. No professional organization was to appear for twenty-five more years. The Club immediately began drawing up a set of standard rules and making plans for a more satisfactory playing field. Draftsman and surveyor Alexander Cart-wright was given the task of preparing a diagram for a new type of field.

By the following year, Cartwright had prepared the diamond diagram which, except for minor changes, is the baseball field used to this day wherever baseball is played. The Knickerbockers also established uniform rules which set the pattern for present-day ball.

The First Game. – The Knickerbockers then issued challenges to take on all comers and the first baseball game ever played under organized rules took place on June 19, 1846, at Elysian Fields (near Hoboken), New Jersey. “The New York Nine” was the opposing team and they beat the Knicks 23-1 in four innings.

So depressed were the Knickerbockers that they played no more inter-city games until 1851, but limited their play to practice games. After five years of practice, they evidently believed they were ready for another go at the game and took on the “Washington Baseball Club of New York” on June 3, 1851 on the same Elysian Fields.

Both teams were tied at the end of the ninth, but the Knicks got two runs in the tenth to win the game 22-20.

From this small beginning, the great game of baseball has developed into the huge game it is today.