saved by the 'net

I haven't made any real effort to follow American sports on a day-to-day basis over here, but I have tried to find ways to watch the big events. The World Series and the Super Bowl were on TV here, on days I was able to watch.
The NCAA Tournament was a little trickier. This is one of my favorite days - I remember filling out brackets and competing against my brother when I was in grade school. When I was in college, I used to cut class to watch as many first-round games as I could. I had the chance to watch a regional live when I was covering the University of Missouri a season the Tigers earned a berth. Last year, I got paid to sit around in sports bars all day and write about watching every game played on the opening day.
Over here, the games started at about 6 a.m. and only one of the earliest games was broadcast, on cable TV (which I don't have). I also had to work. That was a good thing - I spent most of the day poaching the company's bandwidth to watch the games online.
The first year the NCAA streamed video of all the games live came at the perfect time. I watched Montana win its first tournament game in my lifetime, and then Gonzaga pull out a late win against Xavier. Also bits and pieces of just about every game played.
It wasn't quite a packed sports bar or watching with a group of friends, but it was something. And just what I wanted.