Senior Class

Last April, not long after Maryland guard Juan Dixon had become the third straight senior to lord over a Final Four, Bill Walton parachuted into Tucson for a summit meeting of sorts. Over lunch with Arizona's top two juniors—his son Luke and Jason Gardner—and Gardner's uncle, Greg Livers, Big Bill launched into his finest Waltonese: "Jason, you only have ONE CHANCE in life to be a college seeeen-ior, to win an NCAA championship, when EVERYTHING is going to be so purrrr-fect, so joyous." � Instead of rolling his eyes, Gardner pondered the message. Stick around, win a title. The pros can wait. "He helped a lot with my decision to stay," Gardner says, proving that a 50-year-old with two fused ankles can still get into the box score: Assist, Walton. � One year later, on the eve of the NCAA tournament, Gardner and his senior-laden Arizona team (the West Region's No. 1 seed) are perfectly poised to perpetuate the trend. Never in the post-Wooden NCAAs has experience been so vital, whether you're a Final Four contender or one of the prospective giant-slayers of March. Wondering why we're high on Arizona, Oklahoma and Creighton—but not so keen on Texas, Syracuse and UConn? Experience. Scratching your head over our upset specials: Penn over Oklahoma State? Western Kentucky over Illinois? Wisconsin- Milwaukee over Notre Dame? Experience. Perplexed by our love for LSU, which barely got into the tournament? It's a matter of experience.

Callow freshmen and sophomores are less accustomed to walking the tournament's tightrope without a net. "I can tell them what it's like, but it's hard for them to understand until they experience it," says Florida senior forward Matt Bonner of the Gators' fabulous freshmen, guard Anthony Roberson and forward Matt Walsh. "You can't have a bad game or you're out."

Coaches like to say that talent trumps experience, but recent tournament history shows that you need both. Consider: Each of the last three national champions had a transcendent senior at the helm—Michigan State's Mateen Cleaves (2000), Duke's Shane Battier (2001) and Dixon—the first such three-year streak since 1987-89. After a 13-year span in which only one champ ( UCLA in 1995) started three seniors two of the last three titlists (the Spartans and the Terrapins) had done so As for the cuddlier Davids, the last two mid-majors to reach the Elite Eight ( Tulsa in 2000 and Kent State in '02) had, you guessed it, three senior starters.

How did this happen? Aren't seniors supposed to be as endangered as the spotted owl? (And we don't mean Temple's John Chaney.) Well, not entirely. True, the household-name seniors, the four-year NBA icons-in-waiting, have largely disappeared. Of the nation's top 44 high school players in 1999-2000, according to the Blue Ribbon College Basketball Yearbook, only 19 finished this season playing in Division I, including just one of the top 15 ( Michigan State sophomore Kelvin Torbert). If you can imagine a world in which early departures were forbidden, this year's tournament would include 14 players now in the NBA (chart, page 68). And that's not counting the players who skipped college altogether.

In their place has risen a new class of veterans—less blindingly athletic, perhaps, but no less competitive—who are changing the face of the game, and the tournament. To wit:

The elite schools prize "program players" more than ever. Say what you will about the one-year wonders ( Memphis's Dajuan Wagner, Seton Hall's Eddie Griffin, Villanova's Tim Thomas) who steal the headlines, then steal off to make their millions in the NBA. Those guys rarely win anything at the college level, and they often leave their programs worse off than when they arrived. Better to stake your fate on four-year players—your regular Mateens, Shanes and Juans—who continue developing season after season, gaining the wisdom and skills needed for a crowning six-game run to glory.

Small wonder that the tournament's top seeds include such senior-heavy hitters as Arizona (Gardner, Walton and Rick Anderson), Kentucky ( Keith Bogans, Marquis Estill and Jules Camara), Kansas ( Nick Collison and Kirk Hinrich), Oklahoma ( Hollis Price, Ebi Ere and Quannas White) and Pittsburgh ( Brandin Knight and Ontario Lett and Donatas Zavackas). With the exception of Hinrich, it is unlikely that any of those players will be NBA lottery picks, but so what? That hasn't kept their coaches, all of them masters of player development, from building deep, entertaining teams on their senior foundations.

Granted, the mere presence of seniors doesn't guarantee success. "People always say it's great to get those four-year players. Well, yeah, if they can play" says Maryland's lovably cantankerous coach, Gary Williams. "There's nothing worse than getting a guy who can't play who's here for four years." Easy for him to say, since the defending champion Terps have seniors who can play—four of them starters, led by point guard Steve Blake—and a combined 53 tournament games of experience, the most of any roster in the field, ahead of Kentucky (46), Indiana (42), Arizona (39) and Kansas (39).

Thanks to their four-year players, the mid-majors are more dangerous than ever. As Gonzaga, Kent State and Tulsa have shown, early departures for the pros have leveled the playing field for the smaller programs, whose coaches can develop their recruits for four years without fear of losing players to the NBA. "A lot of mid-majors will take a kid who isn't as highly ranked, but by his junior or senior year he's as good as anyone," says Oklahoma coach Kelvin Sampson. Adds Providence coach Tim Welsh, "I think a Kent State or a Gonzaga will be in the Final Four someday soon."

Take Creighton, this year's most upwardly mobile mid-major. As the West Region's sixth seed, the 29-4 Bluejays have all the experience indicators for a deep run: two senior starters, a combined 21 NCAA tournament games played—far more than higher-seeded big boys Wake Forest (nine), Syracuse (five) and Marquette (five)—and an �ber-senior in All-America candidate Kyle Korver. "Each year Kyle has made himself a better shooter, passer and ball handler," says Creighton boss Dana Airman of his lightly recruited forward. "It helps that we're in it for the long haul. We don't lose anybody early to the draft."