The fly-over states rule college basketball. The proof is in the pudding, and the pudding is the month of March.

For years I’ve argued that Indiana produces the best basketball talent. People rarely believe me. Indiana University’s dry spell does not make for a compelling argument, but in my defense, they have not recruited the state well under past leadership. Perhaps the best evidence of Indiana’s basketball prowess is the success of Butler. Even after the states top tier players are scooped up by Kentucky (Marques Tegue), North Carolina (Tyler Zeller), Duke (Mason, Miles, Marshall Plumlee), and Ohio State(Dehaun Thomas) Butler has still been able to put back to back championship caliber teams together.

Get the guys in Indiana to stay in Indiana, and you have an Elite 8 team each year.

Agree with this argument or not, this year’s NCAA tourney has made one thing clear. The best college basketball is in the Midwest.

Four (MSU, OSU, IU, and Wisconsin) sweet 16 teams come from the Big Ten, tied only by the Big East. However, two of those Big East squads (Cinci and Marquette) are not so far east. Ohio made the strongest showing, with four teams representing the state (Cinci, Ohio, OSU, and Xavier). Of the total 16 teams left across the entire county, nine are from the Midwest. One more (Louisville), could be hit from a rock thrown from the Midwest. Only one of the final 16 teams is from west of the Mississippi river. That school is Baylor. In case your University geography is not what it used to be, Baylor is in Texas.  The east coast has some quality teams. The left coast put up a goose egg, which is no surprise. If it weren’t for an Indiana kid named John Wooden, the entire coast would have nothing but hacky sack and Frisbee golf trophies.

But I digress; the point is we can ball, and each year in March we get to show it.