#saint peter's

[illustratus]

Interior of Saint Peter's, Rome by Giovanni Paolo Panini

[echiromani]

Via della Conciliazione, Rome.

[felicedellarovere]

saint peter’s basilica, 2.17.17

[jessiechensaid]

This obelisk has been moved several times by different Roman emperors, and is the only obelisk in Rome that has not collapsed since ancient Roman times. 

St. Peter's Square, Vatican City

[stuartphoto]

Photo Hunter | Saint Peter's Basilica

[postcard-from-the-past]

Saint Peter's church in the Montmartre neighbourhood of Paris

French vintage postcard

[elizabethanism]

Interior of Saint Peter's, Rome, 1740. Looking a bit mysterious & gloomy in all its renaissance splendor. By Giovanni Paolo Panini, at the end of his day.

[tcsparky-blog]

Hooray for Saint Peter’s

The NCAA men's basketball tournament has had their share of Cinderella teams emerge during the long history of the tournament. This year is certainly no exemption. Some very obscure team from Jersey has shocked the college basketball world and is heading to the final 16. That team is Saint Peter's. I have to admit that I had never heard of the school prior to last Thursday. Their school enrollment is only about 2300 which puts them below many D3 schools. Only on rare occasion do they play on television. There upset of Kentucky last Thursday might go down as the biggest upset ever in tournament history. But there are some valuable things that the college basketball world can learn from this shockingly upstart team.

When you look up the word team in the dictionary, chances are you see a picture of the emblem of the school basketball program. This team plays remarkable well as a team. Many players have made personal sacrifices to enable the team to become successful. For instance, the team play routinely plays 10 players per game to max out the effort and intensity of each player. Several of the players had to sacrifice minutes in order to buy into that concept. In this day and age of selfish players who are only looking out for themselves, it is a remarkable thing to see. There are no heavily recruited players or stars on the team as compared to say Kentucky. Just a bunch of good solid players who are well coached and play as one unit. It is all about playing for one another instead of just yourself.

Chances are this school does not have a large budget and the facilities are probably not on par like a major college program. They very seldom play on television at all so it will be hard to recruit many stand out high school players. I am sure a big-time high school player will never ever announce that he wants to play at Saint Peter instead of Duke. Don't get me wrong, they will still get a lot of good but not great players. So, it appears on the surface that the deck is very much stacked against Saint Peter's and other schools like them in the tournament.

That is why if you are a supporter of the underdog, there is no better team to root for right now than Saint Peter's. They represent what basketball and college basketball in particular should be all about. No pampered players who only use college basketball as a brief steppingstone to their pro careers. How can you not root for a team like them even if they blow up your bracket?