2006 Champion Greg Mahon

Fans first met Greg as an installment in the Tournament's "Meet & Greet" feature. Over the last year, Mahon has traveled throughout the country as the very public face of the Henderson NCAA Tournament. Officials recently joined Mahon on a return flight from Oahu, where he served as a guest judge for the 2007 Miss Hawaiian Tropic pageant.

“The negative publicity, no doubt,” said Mahon when asked to describe what surprised him the most over the past 11 months. Mahon, now a regular on tabloid covers throughout the greater Metropolitan area, says he is no longer surprised at what people say about him. “Success breeds hostility, I suppose. I won. They lost. Get over it.”

After some prodding, Mahon admits some of the controversy is self-inflicted. A constant at the nightclub scene (where he calls himself the “G.M. of Partying”), he served a brief stint in rehab last November, though Tournament officials declined comment on specifics surrounding the event. He was pummeled by Rosie O’Donnell while guest hosting The View for repeatedly referring to the rotund host as Rosie O’Donut. And he was escorted from his Rose Bowl parade float for “language and conduct unbecoming a family event”.

Despite the setbacks, Mahon remains focused on becoming the first Henderson NCAA Tournament champion to defend his title. A disciple of the famed Johnson Index, he continues to study the mid-majors and west coast conferences that he feels are short-changed by the East Coast media establishment.

Like any real pro, he does his best scouting work on the couch.

Controversial, yes. But who can argue with success?

Outlining the Johnson Index’s ‘Weighted Road Traveling - Median Metropolitan Census Ratio’ Before the Select Committee