THE FRONT ROW with Mark Nelke, March 20, 2014

The REAL NCAA tournament begins today, in Spokane for fans with tickets to the games at the Arena.

If you're headed to San Diego to watch the Zags, or perhaps elsewhere just to watch, maybe it really starts on Friday.

Whatever.

The consensus is, even if No. 8 seed Gonzaga beats No. 9 Oklahoma State on Friday, its season will end Sunday vs. No. 1 seed Arizona.

I'm not so sure.

Arizona is back to its old spot as a No. 1 seed, but those Wildcat teams were talented and experienced. These days, most elite college teams are talented and inexperienced.

Meanwhile, the Gonzaga business model never changes. Only on occasion does a Zag leave school early; more often than not, what happens is their top players are the same guys for 3-4 years - and they're on TV so much, they seem like they've been there for 6-8 years.

So, that experience might pay off if their game with Arizona remains close deep in the second half - the favorite perhaps tightening up as the underdog applies the pressure. Maybe the Zags go on a deeper tournament run as a lower seed, something they did in the early years of this NCAA tourney streak they are on, which this year has reached 16 straight trips.

But first, Gonzaga has to get past Oklahoma State, a team it is 5-0 against over the last decade.

The Cowboys are talented, but inconsistent, so you never know about them. I thought Oklahoma State was playing pretty well heading into last year's tournament, and the Cowboys just got worked by Oregon in the first round.

THE TRADEOFF for keeping a few more western teams in the West for the first weekend is, your site usually doesn't get any teams better than a No. 4 or No. 5 seed. In the good ol' days, when the winners from the western sites the first weekend actually stayed in the West and went on to play each other for a West Region title, you were guaranteed no worse than a No. 2 seed at your site. One western site got the No. 1 seed, the other the No. 2.

In 2003, the first time the NCAAs were played in Spokane, the best seeds were two No. 4s and two No. 5s. In 2007, the best seed in Spokane was No. 3 Oregon, which went on to lose to eventual national champion Floida in the regional finals. In 2010, Spokane was sent two No. 4 seeds and two No. 5 seeds.

This year, Spokane was sent two No. 4 seeds (San Diego State and Michigan State) and two No. 5s (Oklahoma and Cincinnati).

That said, if you have ducats to the this weekend's games in Spokane - or games at any other site - you bought 'em mostly to experience the NCAA tournament, no matter who you saw. And if you ended up with a North Carolina or a Georgetown or a Duke or another storied national program in your bracket, it was a bonus.

Can you believe the good fortune Spokane NCAA-goers had in 2007, getting to watch Kevin Durant grace the Arena with the final two college games of his only college season?

This year, the closest Spokane has to a marquee team is No. 4 seed Michigan State, which was also shipped to Spokane in 2010, the last time the NCAA came to town.

But that's OK. No matter the pedigree of the teams, chances are something is bound to happen that will make you glad you went.

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter at CdAPressSports.