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2K gave up the college basketball license and now it’s only EA Sports who’s left playing in this field. Now let’s see what EA Sports has to offer with its NCAA Basketball 09 game. Check out the features of this popular sports game:

Execute your Gameplan

Decide what strategies to execute. You can choose from a list of pre-game strategies. Another tool can help you improve your game – the Game Tempo Meter, which lets you adjust your settings in a jiffy.

Game Engine

You can now use styles of play that authentically college in nature. These include trapping defenses, up-tempo transition game, structured half-court sets – all to make sure that your make the most out of your team’s abilities.

Next-Level Authenticity

NCAA Basketball 2009 for every Division I team, offers styles of play that gives true-to-life experience. Scouting reports (courtesy of the Blue Ribbon™ College Basketball Yearbook creators) and authentic team ratings and other features that make gamers feel realistic team tendencies can be expected.

Set the Tempo

According to aficionados of the game, Set the Tempo is the most important gameplay addition to NCAA Basketball 2009. You can choose from these three tempos – Up Tempo, Half Court and Balanced. Either you speed the game up by applying full court pressure, initiate a half-court set through walking the ball up to the floor, or make the most of what your rival gives you with a balanced attack.

Coaching Feedback (Real-Time)

You can also expect more guidance with the help of your school’s coach. There will be real NCAA coaches giving you feedback in real time while on the sidelines. 

Rosters Sharing

If you have been playing NCAA Football for quite some time and you have been having the time of your life with names of real NCAA Football teams and players, now you can also have that with your NCAA Basketball 2009. EA offers an online roster sharing feature using its Online Locker, which will let you create a dynasty with a custom roster. However, individuals and companies also offer roster upload services. It’s either you update your game console yourself or pay for these service providers to upload the roster names.

Aside from those abovementioned features, there are still so many features that will make the die-hard fans of NCAA basketball shout for joy. These other features include Rival Challenge, and the ability to upload and save videos to EA Sports World.

The NCAA Basketball Tournament is among us. This tournament is a looking glass for human hope, excellence and positive social change. It is, in short, a microcosm of the human existence, with all of its exuberance, tragedy and triumph. The NCAA Basketball Tournament is American sports.

The excitement and tradition of “March Madness” or the NCAA Basketball Tournament as we know it today has been shaped by many significant events in NCAA tournament history: The first NCAA men’s basketball tournament was held in 1939 with the first NCAA tournament championship game held at Northwestern on March 27, 1939. Only eight teams competed in two regions. Oregon defeated Ohio State in the championship game, and the West region held a third-place game.

Although the NCAA basketball tournament now determines the national champion, that was not always the case. Until the 1950’s, the NIT was considered a more prestigious tournament than the NCAA basketball tournament, and teams often chose to enter the NIT and bypass the NCAA tourney. Because of this dichotomy, two of the best centers of the 1940’s never met in an NCAA basketball tournament. George Mikan’s DePaul team traditionally entered the NIT, while Bob Kurland’s of Oklahoma.

In 1973, with the championship game held on Monday night for the first time, UCLA behind Bill Walton’s 44 points on 21 of 22 shooting, won its seventh straight championship, defeating Memphis State. NC State, led by David Thompson, ends UCLA’s title run in 1974, defeating the Bruins in the national semifinals in double overtime.

The following year, the NCAA tournament expanded to 32 teams, and then allowed more than one school from each conference to participate. Prior to this ruling, the restriction prevented several great teams from competing in the tournament, including the 1974 Maryland team. They finished the season nationally ranked #4, yet lost the ACC Conference final game to top-ranked NC State prior to the start of the tournament. After that, the NCAA began to allow more than one team per conference to participate. In 1976, Bobby Knight’s Indiana Hoosier squad completed an undefeated season with a victory over Michigan in the championship game. The Hoosiers are the last team to go undefeated and win the title.

The tournament expanded to 40 teams in 1979, and teams were seeded for the first time. “Magic” Earvin Johnson leads Michigan State over Larry Bird and Indiana State to win the national championship. The game drew the attention of millions throughout the country; its 24.1 TV rating remains the highest ever for a college basketball game and is still considered one of the greatest match-ups in NCAA Tournament history.

Expansion followed in 1980 to 48 teams, and then in 1983, to 53 teams. In what many believe is the greatest Cinderella story in college basketball, North Carolina State’s Lorenzo Charles dunks the ball as time expires in the 1983 championship game to lead the Wolfpack to a 54-52 win over heavily favored Akeem Olajuwon and Houston. Perhaps no one figure in college basketball history more personified the spirit of March Madness than Coach Jim Valvano. His underdog North Carolina State Wolfpack did what many consider a miracle by making an incredible run through the 1983 Tournament. Culminating in the defeat of the highly touted “Phi Slamma Jamma” squad from the University of Houston, Valvano was rocketed into the media limelight and quickly became the symbol of exuberance and enthusiasm. He discovered soon afterward that he had bone cancer, and for a short time became a commentator for college basketball. Before his death at age 47, he was named the recipient of the Arthur Ashe award for courage at the first ESPN ESPY awards. It was at this time he announced the formation of the V Foundation for cancer research.

In 1985 the tournament expanded to 64 teams. A Villanova Wildcat team shot a 22 for 28 field goal percentage to defeat Patrick Ewing and defending champion Georgetown in the championship game. Villanova remains the lowest seed (#8) to win the championship. In 1991, Duke upset undefeated UNLV in the semifinals and went on to win the national championship. In 1997, Arizona, led by Mike Bibby, Jason Terry and Miles Simon, becomes the first school to defeat three #1 seeds en route to the national championship, winning against Kansas, North Carolina and Kentucky.

The NCAA Tournament’s popularity has grown to rival that of the World Series, the Olympics and the Super Bowl. CBS Sports in 1999 negotiated an 11-year, $6 billion agreement for television, radio, Internet, corporate marketing, licensing, publishing, home video and Hoop City rights for the Division I men’s basketball championship.

Today the NCAA basketball tournament is one of the most watched tournaments of the year. Always exciting you never really know who is going to end up on top!

C-USA fans have reason to be excited about their conference’s future. Lately this league has been mixing it up with the big boys, acting like it’s a BCS conference instead of a “mid-major.” In fact, according to the numbers and the money, it’s getting harder and harder to distinguish C-USA from conferences like the Pac-10 and the Big 12 when it comes to basketball success and funding. Not to mention, the C-USA has been producing some awesome Tournament teams in the past few years, notably the Memphis Tigers.

This season it looks as though the Tigers of Memphis are taking a year to recuperate after the bailing of their coach and some of their best recruits. This has opened the door for other teams in the C-USA to take the top spot.  Which C-USA teams will make it to the NCAA Tournament?  Will you be able to purchase NCAA basketball tickets from StubHub.com to see a C-USA team in the Final Four this year?  Let’s take a look at some of the best teams in this conference and see which ones have a shot at March Madness glory.

UTEP – The Texas-El Paso Miners are arguably the best team in the C-USA, having fought their way to the top of the standings as of Feb. 21, 2010.  The Miners have a balanced attack coming from Randy Culpepper and Derrick Caracter, and they are one of the better defensive teams in the conference. Most experts are expecting this team to finish with only two conference losses, giving them a nice shot at the league title and thus an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

UAB – The UAB Blazers are right on the heels of the Miners in the conference standings, having earned a 21-5 overall record and a 9-3 record in the conference.  Whereas the Miners are a stronger defensive team, the Blazers are a hot scoring team, relying on Elijah Millsap to bring the points and snag the boards every night—with more or less finesse. One thing that the Blazers have to look out for is the frantic finish to the year. They will play Memphis and UTEP in consecutive games to close out the season.

Memphis – A tourney regular the past few years, Memphis is not out of the running for a spot in March Madness this year. However, they’re rooting for both UTEP and UAB to falter in the last few weeks. Memphis is a stellar offensive team, but they sometimes struggle to play elite interior defense.

Marshall – Not out of the running is Marshall, a team that has suddenly heated up in the past couple of weeks. The Thundering Herd are taking a five game win streak into their Feb. 24 matchup with Rice, a team they should beat easily.  Their last big test is a home game against UTEP on March 2.

So there you have it—a couple of the best C-USA teams and their chances of making the Tourney.  Make sure to see the conference tournament in March, and then get some tickets to follow your favorite C-USA team in the NCAA Tournament.