George Ferguson Column: For me, the fact the Griz are dancing is good enough

On the local scene, it’s been a lot of fun watching basketball the last three-plus months.

You had the Havre High girls, the Box Elder girls, and a whole slew of talented boys and girls high school basketball teams to enjoy. You also had the Montana State University-Northern men and women, and in the Frontier Conference, you got to see former local stars Dane Warp (who is still playing with the Carroll College men at the NAIA national tournament), Dani Wagner and Brandon The Boy. And, to top it off, what a great thing for the state of Montana with the Montana Western Bulldogs winning the NAIA national championship on Tuesday night.

Now, of course, the basketball attention fully turns to March Madness and the start of the NCAA men’s tournament today, and, for those of you who like your college basketball with a local flavor, you get that with March Madness for the second year in a row.

That’s because tonight in Des Moines, Iowa, the Montana Grizzlies will be a part of March Madness when they take on the mighty Michigan Wolverines. It’s the second year in a row in which the Griz meet Michigan in the Big Dance, and, for the Griz, for Griz Nation and really, for the state of Montana, in basketball terms, it doesn’t get any bigger than tonight’s game.

That’s right, for an NCAA Division I team from Montana, which means either the Griz, or the Montana State Bobcats, just playing in an NCAA tourney game is the mountain top. For us here in Montana, it’s the Holy Grail, it’s the Super Bowl and Christmas Day all rolled into one.

That sounds dramatic, but it’s true, and here’s why.

If your a sane, rational thinking Griz fan, and sometimes, I question if there are any (myself included), than you know, the chances of Montana beating the Wolverines tonight are very, very slim. In fact, if we’re being honest, we probably feel like we have a better chance of winning the Power Ball than Montana does tonight in Des Moines.

Now, I know what many of you are thinking when you read that statement: UMBC just did it last year. And others before them have done it. The little guy has beaten the big dog, and we no longer live in a March Madness era where a Sixteen Seed has never beaten a One Seed. I know, you don’t have to remind me. I saw it, and I know the history of college basketball. I know about Valporaiso and Chaminade and all the other great upsets in college hoops history.

Hell, even a Big Sky team has done it when Weber State once knocked off my North Carolina Tar Hells in a first-round game.

In other words, I know anything is possible. Even the Griz have advanced to the second round of the NCAA tourney as recently as 2012. So yes, it’s possible.

And even knowing that, I don’t believe for one second Montana will win tonight, and you know what? I don’t care.

For the Griz, and many other teams like them, schools who are small, who play in small conferences and who only pay their coaches a fraction of what the John Calipari’s of the world get paid, it doesn’t matter if they beat the big dog this weekend. It just doesn't.

What does matter is, they are part of the Dance.

It matters that Montana repeated as Big Sky Conference champions. It matters that they earned their way into another NCAA tournament. It matters that they give Michigan their best shot on national television tonight. It matters that the game will be recapped on Sportscenter tonight, when no other Griz game ever is. It matters that maybe, just maybe, a Griz highlight from tonight’s game, or shot of Monte the mascot or a Griz cheerleader will end up as part of CBS’ “One Shining Moment” after the national championship game in two weeks.

As a Griz fan, that’s what this is all about. It’s about Montana being there. It’s about the Griz being one of 68 teams that got invited to the Madness.

In this world of winning is everything, this week, and tonight for Montana, and for all of the little guys, it actually just isn’t true. Now, I know Montana head coach Travis DeCuire and his players don’t agree with me. They are taking the floor tonight with one goal — to win, and that’s the way it should be. And, of course, I want the Griz to win as badly as anybody.

But what I’m pointing out is, if they don’t, it doesn’t make any difference. The Griz did what they set out to do when practice started back in October, they won a conference championship and got to the Madness. They’re in, they’re there, playing Michigan again, for the whole world to see, and for teams like Montana or Abeline Christian or Farleigh Dickinson, that’s always the dream, and the dream has already been fulfilled.

Win or lose tonight, the Griz have made their biggest basketball dream come true already, and while I'm as maniacally competitive as anyone out there, in this one instance, in the case of March Madness, the Griz just being there is good enough for me.

Montana meets Michigan tonight at 7:20 p.m. in Des Moines. The game will be televised nationally on TNT.