I cried tonight for Billy Donavon and his Gators. Billy is one of our family with Wildcat roots deep and wide. He was there in the dark, dark days of probation when many would have laughed at the chance to come to Lexington and did but he saw something at Kentucky for himself. His first year in Lexington he took a paycut that many would not have but he did it for love of college basketball and I salute him for that. He grew up as a young coach watching the unselfishness of the Unforgettables and the pain of their heartache in Philadelphia. Then he helped lay the groundwork for Kentucky's sixth National Championship with the class of 1992 that was Kentucky finest class in many a year in both talent and will to win. Since leaving for Marshall in 1994 I have watched him grow as a coach and human being with a love for the game of College Basketball I share. Tonight was his night and his team's night and I salute them not as a Wildcat fan but as a College Basketball fan. Tonight as One Shinning Moment played I realized that for the last 20 Final Fours I have marked my life by where I was stationed at that time and the ways I invented to be able to watch the Final Four. Well tonight was my last Final Four as a Active Duty Sailor ( I retire 01 Jan 2007) and in that moment I realized how many memories that I have from these last 20 years. From my first Final Four in 87 fresh out of boot camp trying to sneak a peak of the IU and Syracuse game on the TV even when I was suppossed to be in the middle of a weekly cleanup of the barracks. Then there was the 91 Final Four that I enjoyed at a local watering hole in Jacksonville as I had just gotten back from Desert Storm and my cable hadn't been hooked up yet. Then the next year there was the pain of listening to Cawood's final call. I purposely stopped my moving van on I-64 (after that game in Philadelphia I had to move from Florida to Rhode Island via Kentucky.......what a long ride that was) just west of the West Virginia line so that I could hear Cawood call one last game while I was in the Commonwealth of Kentucky. Finally there was the joy and pain of 93 as it was a joy just to be back in the Final Four but the pain of losing a tough one to Michigan. Then there was the night in 96 that I listened to the National Championship on the Radio to hear Kentucky win it all. In 98 I was able to watch the games live and in my own home and there was the joy and tears of winning it all and me being able to see it live after so many years of heartache and pain. There were many times I have been deployed to watch the Final Four and it has been fun each and every time. I guess tonight is the start of the process of seperating one self menatility from the military and every thing that goes with. Finally and once again my salutes to Billy D. and his Gators for one helluva game and one helluva season.