Remembering the Memorable

Inspired by this piece from Fanhouse (Feel free to read it before or after.  Just know that it may not be suitable for work.  That is, if getting highly emotional happens to be not suitable at your office).

I was 8 years old when I had my first taste of March Madness.  Sure everyone likes to look back to 1986 and pretend that Buckner brother their heart, too.  Or, they pretend that the Bears stomping of the Pats had significant meaning for them as a 4 year-old.  It's all bullshit.  But when you're 8, things finally start to come into focus.  Your own sports "career" is beginning to take flight.  You are no longer hitting off the tee, the three-point line seems a little closer, and you're wrist shot might even be getting some separation from the ice.  Seemingly as a result (or maybe it's just coincidence), sports as entertainment (rather than exercise) begins to take on a bigger role in your life.  Memories begin to fasten themselves to your being.  Often times they're silly; such as Pete Stoyanovich's NFL record 58-yard playoff field goal against the Chiefs (I was actually 9 when that happened, but let's not split hairs).  But some memories are not silly.  Rather, they are meaningful and perhaps more importantly, enduring.  My first memory of March Madness falls into the meaningful, enduring category.  And the reason for this is because of Hank Gathers.

Hank Gathers was one of the greatest college basketball players of all time and he also happened to play for one of the most exciting basketball teams if all time.  Loyola Marymount?  Really?  Without question.  At this time in my life, I had no idea who Hank Gathers was.  Sure, I saw the replay when he collapsed on the court against Portland during the West Coast Conference tournament, heard the news about his death, and understood at the time that it was a tragic event.  Only, I didn't really get it until a week later, when my family decided to fashion our own little pool celebrating the onset of March Madness.

But unlike most pools where the participants fill out their brackets completely, picking a winner through their own process of elimination, my family utilized the odd system of picking teams out of a hat.  We each picked four pieces of paper out of a hat (there were four of us), and I can't even be sure how it worked, but I assume we left out teams ranked 13th and higher, leaving 48 possible teams.  The details are a bit muddled and I can remember that my dad got UNLV and my brother got Duke and Ball State.  Me?  I got Loyola Marymount.  The other 3 teams that I picked?  They don't really matter.

So I got an 11-seed.  And an emotionally distressed 11-seed at that.  And one missing their best player.  Sweet.  Why were 11-seeds even available in this pool?  Little did I realize that I had drawn the best possible team in the entire field.  For LMU went on a straight up tear, ripping through New Mexico State (6), Michigan (3), and Alabama (7) all the way to the Elite Eight, where they would meet the eventual NCAA champion, UNLV (who cheated to get there, but I digress).  And they did this, WITHOUT THEIR BEST PLAYER: Hank Gathers.

The day Loyola Marymount lost was a bad day.  In fact, it was the first time I had ever cried as a result of a sporting outcome, one that I participated in or simply watched. The strange thing is that at the time, I didn't even appreciate Bo Kimble's lefty demonstration, or the WCC's decision to suspend the tournament and simply give the title to LMU, or how important Gathers truly was to the team.  What can I say?  I've always been a bleeding heart.  But, it's that bleeding heart that is the reason I love sports and the reason why this blog even exists (other than it's obvious usefulness in keeping me distracted while at work).  It's a passion, and what it comes down to is luck and emotion.

Luck, because well, maybe you were born in Dallas in the late 70's and all those titles came when you could fully enjoy them as a young or old teenager.  Or maybe you grew up in Florida, but your dad was a Yankees fan, and in turn, you were a Yankees fan... Instead of a Florida placeholder fan.  Luck because you happened to pulled the name "Loyola Marymount" out of a hat just before your sports coming-of-age.

And then there's emotion.  It's what ties us to the game.  Sure, you could have been born in San Francisco in the 60's, but you could have been more invested in water colors than Jerry Rice.  Or, you could enjoy watching pro football in Oxford, Mississippi, but really could not care less if the Saints ended up with the Super Bowl or not, but the Rebels winning the Cotton Bowl was all that really mattered.  Loyola Marymount and the story of Hank Gathers provided my first true sense of attachment to sports entertainment.  I watched my dad and brother invest themselves, I remember my first Sox game (age 5 vs. Toronto), my first Bruins game (age 6 vs. Vancouver, and the Little League World Series (age 7, Trumbull, CT v. China), but this was the first time I felt something real, something personal, and something that would end up staying with me, well, for 20 years now.

3 years later, a similar incident would occur.  A young athlete would go before his time, I would cry, even attend the funeral, and out of that tragedy, I would grow closer to sports (not to the Celtics, of course. They were awful). And to this day, in lieu of the fierce rivalries and the divided loyalties, I still always try to appreciate all of the special athletes out there, especially those that are good people.  Because, you just never know when they are going to be gone; out of the game, out of your life, and into your heart, only because there is no place else for them to go.

And so here we are 20 years later, and you see before you the monster that was created.  And it's all thanks to Hank Gathers, Loyola Marymount, and one really silly method for celebrating March Madness.  Thanks, everybody.