It's Cinderella vs. Cinderella in Friday night's Sweet 16 showdown for the St. Mary's men's basketball team. When the Gaels strap on their glass slippers and take the court in Houston, they'll face another underdog mid-major school that's never been this deep in the tournament.
The yellow-and-green Baylor Bears lie in wait for the Gaels, with a tip-off time of 4:27 p.m. PST Friday afternoon.
As with every single other tournament game they've played this March, St. Mary's is not supposed to win this thing Friday night. As of the morning of the game, Vegas sports books are favoring Baylor by five points.
Baylor's tenacious defense has allowed only 66.4 points per game this season. St. Mary's center Omar Samhan has averaged nearly half that much just by himself in this NCAA Tournament, with 30.5 points per game. Something's got to give.
One of these two sleeper Cinderella teams will enjoy the biggest win in school history tonight, and will find themselves one win away from the Final Four.
The other team turns back into a pumpkin.
Joe Kukura is a freelance writer who finds the idea of glass slippers to be kind of sadistic, actually.
