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Just as the public has lately been surprised to discover that football is really a very perilous game for your head, those Americans who do not pay that much attention to sports have been brought up short recently to learn better what an incredibly hypocritical and autocratic cartel is the National Collegiate Athletic Association.

In particular, Kentucky's victory in the NCAA basketball championship — all thanks to a handful of young transients barnstorming for a few months as what the NCAA calls student-athletes — has shocked casual observers of the educational sporting scene. Good grief, The New York Times was even stunned enough to feel obliged to editorialize on the matter.

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In 2010, David Plant was diagnosed with skin cancer. The cancer has since metastasized to other parts of his body, and David is now contemplating the end of his life. So, just before his 81st birthday, he sat down with his stepson to talk about their life together.

As Frank Lilley explains, "David is my stepfather, but I certainly consider him my father."

The two spoke in in New London, N.H. And Frank began with a question.

"So, you first met me when I was about 9 or 10 years old, when you married my mother," he says. "And I'm just wondering what your impressions were of me at the time."

"You were a good-looking, athletic guy, but you were in the unhappy situation of a broken family," David says.

College basketball's Final Four men's teams will play in New Orleans Saturday, to decide which two squads will play in Monday night's NCAA championship game. The first match-up pits the University of Louisville against tournament favorite — and archrival — the University of Kentucky. In the second game, Ohio State University will face the University of Kansas.

Kentucky is the lone No. 1 seed to make this year's Final Four. Both Kansas and Ohio State are No. 2 seeds, while Louisville was seeded fourth. Of the four teams, Kentucky is the only one to score more than 80 points in every game it's played in the 2012 tournament.