How I wound up covering March Madness today with my identical twin
MILWAUKEE — My twin brother Ben has been the one constant in every NCAA tournament during my life.
The first March Madness games I remember watching were in my grandmother's basement in Wichita, Kansas. I camped out there with my brothers and cousin on spring break, equipped with junk food and a paper bracket. We lived and died with every upset because winning $100 in the family bracket pool is an unmatched exhilaration for a 10-year-old kid.
I watched the more recent NCAA tournaments from campus at Oklahoma State. The RA's probably didn't appreciate the noise level in Patchin Hall in 2022 when North Carolina blew a 25-point second-half lead against No. 1 Baylor, just to win in overtime. We just caught the end of No. 15 Oral Roberts' 2021 win over No. 2 Ohio State on a phone at a patchy intramural softball field.
In all my memories of March Madness, a matchup-based tournament that has achieved fame through its unpredictability, my identical twin Ben has always been there. Wildly, the 2025 NCAA tournament is no different.
I became the Clarion Ledger's Ole Miss beat reporter in September of 2024. Ben got a job covering Iowa State for the Quad-City Times a few days later. We moved 11 hours away. It was weird. Ben was my roommate, my teammate in every sport and 50% stakeholder in our first car. From first grade though college graduation, we only had one class apart. I think I messed up the scheduling our freshman year at OSU.
No. 6 Ole Miss (23-11) will face No. 3 Iowa State on Sunday (6:45 p.m., TruTV) in the Fiserv Forum. After we moved apart to chase our shared dream, a bracket full of twists, turns and upsets somehow kept our March tradition alive — in our first years on our beats, no less.
The game itself could go either way. Like the victorious team, one twin will head to Atlanta. The other will head home. The game, though, is just a piece of what has made the week so memorable.
Spending the week together in Milwaukee has felt, well, normal. Perhaps that's to be expected. We talk pretty much every day. Part of the curse of being an identical twin is not being able to enjoy doing or hearing something fun until you've told your brother.
The best part of March Madness has been meeting Ben's friends. We've had the same set our whole lives. Meeting, and being immediately accepted by the people Ben works with on the Iowa State beat has been awesome. When I hung out at Steny's Tavern & Grill on Thursday night with the Iowa State contingent, it felt like everyone already knew me. I guess in a way they did.
Getting to introduce the Ole Miss delegation to Ben has been priceless. For it to happen because a selection committee that doesn't know either of us sent our teams to Milwaukee, and both teams advanced to the second round, is mind boggling.
There's talk the NCAA tournament has lacked chaos this year. For the first time since 2008, all four No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3 and No. 4 seeds advanced to the second round. When I'm sitting courtside watching the team I cover play the team Ben covers, I'll never doubt the March Madness moniker.
Sam Hutchens covers Ole Miss for the Clarion Ledger. Email him at Shutchens@gannett.com or reach him on X at @Sam_Hutchens_
This article originally appeared on Mississippi Clarion Ledger: March Madness reporter covering Ole Miss vs Iowa State with his twin
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