This year's NCAA tournament has been nothing short of spectacular. As a member of an NCAA Division II national championship team many people ask me this time of year, what makes a championship team? Here are three questions to ask when looking at teams:

1. Are they fearless?

2. Do the play with mental toughness or an edge?

3. Do they have the killer instinct? In other words, do they specifically have players that will refuse to be in the passenger seat and will take the steering wheel at crunch time?

Watching LSU this year the answers are 1. Yes, 2. Yes and 3. Yes. Even though LSU is extremely young - made up predominantly of freshmen and sophomores and in contrast to young similarly talented teams like Kansas and North Carolina, Kansas and North Carolina do not warrant yes answers to the aforementioned questions.

Also not lost on me or on the LSU players is that you can be sure that Duke may have passed on Tyrus Thomas, Darrel Mitchell, Tasmin Mitchell & "Big Baby" Glen Davis et al .

Tyrus Thomas embodies the mental toughness necessary to succeed in the tourney and says it best:

"My mindset is to take my opponent's heart and take his soul," Thomas added. "That's what I try to do night in and night out. Get the best of my opponent and make him quit before I do. I never quit." After blocking a shot by Duke freshman big man Josh McRoberts, Thomas stared down the former McDonald's All-American." When he stops making eye contact, I know I'm in him," Thomas said. "I don't do it in an arrogant way, but I just let him know that he was a McDonald's All-American and I wasn't. He goes to Duke. I didn't get recruited by them. He's known as one of the premier players in America. I'm not."

LSU was one of my final four picks along with “sleeper” Nevada which was never awake in the tourney, UConn who fell to an incredible George Mason team and UCLA, who also made it to Indianapolis in dramatic fashion. OK, I’m human but 2 for 4 – respectable especially compared to other analysts final four picks this year.

It is really anyone’s championship to win and congratulations to each team for making it to the final four! You’ve all passed my championship litmus test!!!