ESPN Men's Basketball

Here are some of the best moments from recent Midnight Madness events:

Clemson and Texas A&M
A&M had an outdoor event on a portable court on a parking lot in the major student entertainment district in College Station. Clemson's also was held outside.

ESPNU Madness coverage
ESPNU's The U has all the Midnight Madness coverage, kicking off at 7 ET and bringing you the madness from five top-name schools: 7-8pm: The U: Mid. Madness 8-9pm: The U: Memphis 9-10pm: The U: Kansas 10-11pm: The U: Kentucky 11-Mid.: The U: Michigan State Midnight-1am: The U: Oregon

Florida
William Hung of "American Idol" fame threw a bounce pass to David Lee in the slam-dunk contest. Hung sang three or four songs and the crowd went wild.

Maryland
Gary Williams rode out to center court in a "Fear the Turtle" NASCAR car. The school also held a look-alike contest for him.

Dayton
Frank Iguodala (Andre's older brother) knocked one of his teeth out during the dunk contest when he hit his face on the rim. Iguodala landed smoothly enough that not everyone knew he hit the rim, but walk-on Greg Kohls saw the tooth fly toward the stands. He ran immediately from the bench to where it landed, picked it up and took it to trainer Steve Foster. Foster preserved it and the tooth was reinserted the next day between practices. Kohls is now in his second year of medical school at the University of Cincinnati.

Arizona
Jason Gardner surprised the 'Zona fans in attendance by coming on court with his head painted in school colors -- half red and half blue.

Kentucky
Post man Jason Parker was in the last stages of recovering from offseason knee surgery. In the locker room before the Wildcats took the floor for Midnight Madness, Parker was horsing around with some teammates. He reinjured his knee and was lost for the season.

Arizona
Richard Jefferson jumped over a cheerleader during the dunk contest.

Florida
The year after reaching the national-title game, while introducing the team, they played "Thriller" and rolled a coffin out onto the floor. It opened up and Billy Donovan came out of it.

Cincinnati
Melvin Levett jumps over a golf cart and dunks, sending the crowd into a frenzy.

Hawaii
6-foot-4 freshman walk-on Oa McGee won the slam-dunk contest. En route to winning the title, he made a Jordan-like leap over four "Baywatch Hawaii" actresses (Stacy Kamano, Simone Mackinnon, Brooke Burns and Brandy Ledford) who were lying side-by-side on the floor near the basket.

Michigan State
Coach Tom Izzo's entrances have become a highlight at Michigan State. In 1999, Izzo rode into the Breslin Center on a Harley-Davidson motorcycle. In other years, Izzo has made the crowd crazy by taking the court via limo and horse. And one year, he rappelled from the roof of the Breslin Center.

Texas A&M-Corpus Christi
A year before playing its first game, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi held its first practice. There were two players, two coaches and four fans in attendance. Coach Ronnie Arrow, in the process of building a program from scratch, held the smallest Midnight Madness in history to make a point. "I wanted to do this because I wanted everybody to take a look around and remember what it's like," said Arrow, dressed in a tuxedo. "I wanted them to picture what it's like next year at this time. One year from now, this place will be packed."

Rhode Island
Jim Harrick crowd-surfs down to the court in his first Midnight Madness at URI.

Kansas
Scot Pollard became the first basketball player in KU history to score 14 points, grab seven rebounds and block four shots while wearing bright red polish on all 10 fingernails. "Revlon Vixen" was the eccentric player's color of choice. That's the night Pollard, who is now with the Indiana Pacers, proposed to his girlfriend, Mindy Camp. She accepted.

Memphis
The highlight of the evening was Michael Wilson's attempt to break the vertical-height dunk record of 11 feet, seven inches. Wilson attempted a dunk of 11 feet, eight inches and fell about one half-inch from successfully making the attempt. ESPN covered Wilson's attempt.

Kentucky
Wally Clark of Lexington was determined to be "first in line" and arrived 17 days early. The preseason No. 1 team in the nation was introduced with the premier of "Cat Fan Forever." Seniors Walter McCarty and Tony Delk swooped down on ropes from high above dressed as "Catman" and Robin. They finished their careers by swooping down on UK's sixth national title.

Mississippi State
The highly anticipated debut of junior college phenom Dontae' Jones was closing in, and ESPN2 was there. Just before the Deuce went on the air, Jones thought they were live and ran down the floor and performed an amazing dunk and the place erupted. The TV audience missed it. MSU would later go on to reach the Final Four behind Jones, who was the SEC Tournament and Southeast Regional MVP.

Arkansas
Arkansas' Midnight Madness following the school's 1994 national championship made it around the world when CNN cut in and broadcast a portion of the event.

Cincinnati
His task was simple: Sink a half-court shot and save the parents a couple thousand dollars. "I've obviously done these shots, but no one really practices them," said Cory Clouse, who was confident that he could hit the shot a ridiculous 20 percent of the time. "Just by fooling around before, I knew I could make it. I knew how to shoot it."

Exactly what happened after the ball left his hands is a blur to Clouse.

"When I let the ball go off my fingers, it kind of rolled off my fingertips," he said. "I knew by the feel of it that it was an air ball. But then the ball carried a little higher and a little longer than I thought it would. And then there's this moment, you can see it on the videotape, where I realize that this shot has got a chance to go in. I can see the change in me." Swish. "When it came down, it had hit the floor before I realized that it went in. It was just this feeling of great disbelief. I didn't know what to do, the mascot was hugging me and Dicky V jumped into my arms -- he was weightless."

Vitale was so excited that he forgot that he had a job to do. "It was such a dream that I even forgot I was on TV," Vitale said. "I was absolutely blown away and I let all my enthusiasm out. That night I was just like a 10-year-old kid, having a blast."

Dayton
UD alum Dan Patrick emceed Oliver Purnell's first "Flyer Madness." UD had 500 Keith Olbermann masks made up and gave them to the the people in the sections closest to Dan to wear them for his enjoyment. He said it was the scariest thing he'd ever seen in his life.

Peter Newmann is the college basketball researcher for ESPN.