Jacksonville NCAA Tournament Notebook: Group heads to Jacksonville for 21st big dance in a row

Staff WriterFlorida Times-Union
Published 11:10PM ET March 21, 2015

Group adds to tournament visits

Jacksonville made it 21 in a row for a group of friends who went to high school together in Connecticut.

David Coleman, John Kelly, Leo Pellerin and Dave Cochefski are basketball nuts and the NCAA tournament has been their buddy trip since 1995 in Memphis.

The group has been in Jacksonville this weekend and follows the usual pattern: six games, mixed with tourism.

“We’ve loved it in Jacksonville, especially getting out of the winter we’ve had,” said Coleman, who lives in Kansas City, Mo., while the other three remain in the Hartford area where they all graduated from Newington High in the early 1980s. “On basketball days, we’re at the games. On the off-days we’re visiting anything that’s a tourist attraction.”

There are some rules:

They only go to early-round sites, because they get more games (six).

They never go to the same city twice.

They refuse to go to chain restaurants. One of the group is responsible for researching websites to find the best places.

Since the NCAA tournament schedule is out for 2016, the group will make it 22 cities in 22 years. They’ve decided to go to a regional in Brooklyn, N.Y.