The cancellation of the 2020 NCAA Men’s and Women’s Basketball Tournaments led many sports enthusiasts to seek alternative outlets to slake their competitive thirsts. For BYU Sports Nation hosts Spencer Linton and Jarom Jordan, this took the form of simulated tournaments on NCAA Basketball 2009 on Jordan’s PlayStation 2.

The tournaments took place from early Tuesday morning until late Wednesday night: “It was a lot of work to update the rosters of all 136 teams to include their current players, but it was really worth it,” said Jordan. “Spence and I spent days with the ‘make-a-player’ feature to get everyone’s faces just right.”

The digital tournaments proved to be no challenge at all for the virtual Cougars, with the Men’s team winning their five games by an average of 57.3 points. The Women’s team proved to be more dominant, winning their games by an average of 65.1 points.

“We wanted to make sure we brought home both ‘ships for all of Cougar Nation,” said Linton. “Playing the tournament on ‘Freshman’ (beginner) difficulty was a decision we made to ensure that for all the fans.”

Linton later stated that the next time both tournaments are canceled, he and Jordan will consider raising the difficulty to “Sophomore,” though no firm commitments were made. Linton also requested that credit be given to Jordan’s mother for “bringing a hot plate of pizza rolls in at just the right time.”

The NCAA is expected to ratify BYU’s titles within the next week. Banners commemorating the championships will be raised at next year’s home openers. The sweats that Jordan and Linton were wearing during their grueling tournament run will be placed in the BYU Sports Hall of Fame, and the MARB will soon be re-named the JLB their honor.