If you have access to the Wisconsin State Journal, I strongly suggest you get one today.

To commemorate the WIAA state boys basketball tournament (which, conveniently, starts this afternoon at the Kohl Center in Madison), today’s State Journal includes “Hometown History,” a chronicle of the 99* previous state tournaments.

(What does the asterisk mean? I put it there because, well, how many state tournaments there have been depends on how you define “state.” The first high school state-ish tournament in the U.S. was held at Lawrence College (now University) in Appleton from 1905 to 1918. The history of what now is the WIAA state tournament dates back to 1916, when the state Normal Schools — then schools to train teachers, now known as UW–______ —  held a tournament organized by the normal schools’ athletic directors. The normal schools and Lawrence tournaments were held until 1918. What is now the WIAA took over in 1920, but the WIAA counts the normal schools tournament as the first state tournament.)

Stories include one observer’s list of top moments, Madison’s state champions, fabled teams from the late Milwaukee Lincoln and Dodgeville (Wisconsin’s answer to “Hoosiers”), and The Shot.

There’s also a piece talking about the impact of having the entire state tournament on free TV, by the announcer of many of those state games, Jay Wilson. (Who now is not announcing said state games because he works for a competing station.) Wisconsin apparently is the only state that broadcasts every game of the state boys and girls tournaments on free TV. (And let’s hope that continues despite the logistical headaches of the WIAA’s wrongheaded move to move girls’ state to Green Bay.) And, by the way, you can watch every game today through Saturday, on the air, online and — new! — on a mobile device.

The section includes a story about a certain Madison high school’s state title, written by someone who was there.