There's March madness on both sides of the border

This is an excerpt from The Buzzer, which is CBC Sports' daily email newsletter. Stay up to speed on what's happening in sports by subscribing here.

While the NCAA men's and women's basketball tournaments get most of the attention, this time of year is chock full of collegiate sports championships in both the United States and Canada. Here's a look at some of the most interesting stuff going on, from a Canadian perspective:

NCAA men's basketball tournament

After three days off, the tourney resumes tonight with the first half of the Sweet 16 round. By the end of the weekend, we'll know who's headed to the Final Four in New Orleans.

The top two favourites to win the title are still alive, thanks largely to an essential Canadian player on each team. Andrew Nembhard led top-ranked Gonzaga this season in minutes, assists and steals, and the senior guard helped the Bulldogs dodge an upset by Memphis in the second round by scoring 23 points, including some clutch free throws down the stretch. Second-ranked Arizona, which is the No. 1 seed in its quadrant of the bracket, would probably be out if not for the second-round heroics of Bennedict Mathurin. The sophomore guard, who led the Wildcats in scoring this season and won their conference's player-of-the-year award, nailed a three-pointer to force overtime and scored six points in OT to finish with 30 in a sweaty win over TCU. He also threw down a hellacious dunk.

Nembhard and the Zags tip off the Sweet 16 tonight when they play Arkansas, a 4 seed, at 7:09 p.m. ET. Mathurin and Arizona face a tough 5 seed in Houston, which reached the Final Four last year, at 10 p.m. ET.

Two other Canadians played significant roles in getting their teams to the Sweet 16. 7-foot-4 centre Zach