<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">Keith Smart doesn't quite know how to describe it. But there's something about this time of year. "Every March a feeling comes over me," said Smart, a Warriors assistant. "I feel completely different. When I hit March, I just feel good." That was certainly the case 20 years ago. Or maybe it's because of what happened that night on March 30, 1987. Smart forever chiseled his name into the lore of the NCAA tournament by hitting a jump shot with five seconds remaining that gave Indiana a 74-73 victory over Syracuse in the championship game. It instantly became one of those magical moments that have helped make March Madness, well, so mad. Indiana, with Bobby Knight at the height of his domineering power, may have been the bluest of the college basketball blue bloods. But Smart, now 42, epitomized the little underdogs who each March capture the nation's attention. Here was a guy who struggled just to play junior college basketball. Against all odds, the former fast-food burger-flipper had landed at Indiana. "I remember a commentator saying once, `There's a bunch of McDonald's All-Americans out on the floor and one guy who worked at McDonald's,'" Smart said. And the story got better. The Final Four that year was at the New Orleans Superdome - where Smart had worked as an usher during Saints games when he was in the Boy Scouts. When the final seconds ticked down, everyone expected the ball to end up in the hands of Hoosiers sharpshooter Steve Alford. Instead it was the unheralded, hometown kid putting up the shot. "The really amazing thing is how I got into that moment in the first place," Smart said. "It was beyond perfect." Why do so many love the NCAA tournament so much? It's guys like Smart.</div> Source
