College basketball announcer Bill Raftery looks on before a college basketball game between the Connecticut Huskies and the Marquette Golden Eagles at Harry A. Gampel Pavilion on March 5, 2025 in Storrs, Connecticut. Getty Images

The players arrive and depart at blinding speed now. Coaches get hired, move onward, get fired, get replaced. More than ever it feels like college basketball has ingested a heaping pile of steroids: ever bigger, ever broader, with absurd amounts of money on the table now.

Which is why, Monday evening, it was so important — so vital — to see a player use the backboard while taking a shot, and one more time out of the television there came …

“… with a kiss!”

In that moment, there was no need to concern yourself even a little with the serious matter that litter

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