Let's start right away in Athens, from the moment I got here...props again to the guys from Sigma Phi Epsilon who gave me directions and launched into great sports conversation.

I was fortunate enough to have a great tour guide in Athens. Marielle, a friend of a friend, was kind enough to give me a tour of the UGA campus, shortcuts to the stadium, as well as places to park, things to see, places to go, and gave me enough ideas to keep me outside exploring Athens when not at the games. It's always much more fun to be checking out your surroundings instead of staying in a hotel room for hours until game time, and many thanks to Marielle for her help and kindness during this weekend.

I thank the UGA Campus Police. All during my days in college, I hated the campus police. UGA's though was extremely helpful. They gave me a great spot to park every time, all while keeping my car safe, and even helped me get out of the stadium with ease.

Special thanks to Joelle, one of many ushers at Foley Field. She worked tirelessly to make sure I had what I needed, and given it was my first time in Athens, I appreciated her efforts.

A big thanks to Kimberly at UGA's Tate Student Center. Her main job is managing the pool hall/game room at the Student Center, but she took a lot of time to tell me about UGA athletics and some history of the Bulldogs. She was an absolute pleasure to talk to and get to know, and I thank her for giving me all the time that she did.

Great thanks as well to the fans of both Georgia and South Carolina, who filled me with tons of information about their players, as well as giving me great input on the CSTV blogs. Great baseball fans on both sides, which only made this Super Regional that much better.

Covering college baseball is incredible, mostly because this tournament is so much more than just baseball. It's a bond between young and old, as both slap hands with each other and celebrate their team's success. It's a step back from professionals, big money contracts, and big stadiums that cost a lot to see the action from much further away than any other ball park around. Sure, we can talk aluminum bats all you want, but this tournament shows us all why we love college athletics, and why CSTV exists today.It's a combination of raw passion, intensity, spirit, focus, determination, pain for failures and joy for glories. We're all lucky for being able to witness the best qualities of mankind through college athletics.

This tournament takes the ordinary and makes them extraordinary. It's about players like Princeton's Erik Stiller, who signed a major league contract this week, and probably would've never been heard of by scouts had he not pitched so well against Oklahoma State. It's about volunteers, who serve food and drink, or act as ushers, or in the case of the Razorback Diamond Dolls, do a variety of needed chores to keep the games running smoothly. It's about groundskeepers, who take a downpour hours before game time and still manage to keep a place like Foley Field in pristine condition. It's about forgoing big-name singers, who care about their voice more than the song, and replacing them with singers like Arkansas sophomore Rachel Smithson, who cares more about the song than anything else. It's about fans that wait for hours and hours for the chance to sit in kudzu, like students and fans alike did here in Georgia, or fans who will travel across the country, and even when their team is out, will stay and watch more because of how great the event is, as so many Princeton fans did last week.

This tournament has done a lot of good for me as well. I'm grateful for fans who drove hours away for a regional, and when they saw me sitting in the media section, went over to compliment me while I complimented their team's play. It's fans who just this morning welcomed me as if I was family and kept me entertained, that make it refreshing for a writer who makes all-day drives to cover this great event. It's even people from old college classes who find you online to tell you that you're doing well (by the way, thanks Sarah!) and people from old jobs that wil do anything to fill you with more information to help you in your cause (thanks Mike!).

It's only fitting that the CWS isn't in New York or LA, or anywhere else where tabloids and celebrity news rule the day. It's held in Omaha, a Midwest town where fans, and teams, from all corners of the country can congregate and celebrate the accomplishments of some amazing college athletes. I can only hope that the people in Omaha can make people feel as good as I've felt covering the Regionals and Super Regionals.

My final analysis is all that's left from this weekend in Athens. I'll have that up next. Thanks again to everyone who helped me, and everyone who's reading this blog as well. Keep coming back to CSTV.com!