I remember the last NCAA game I listened to in 2020 was a first round game in the ACC Tournament. I didn’t realize the NCAA had already started playing games without people in the stands. The next day I read all NCAA championships would be suspended. Sports over the next year was a drag. The nonsense with the NBA bubble. A sloppy 60 game season for MLB. NCAA Football was helter skelter with lower division schools more or less cancelling their seasons. Some talk about cancelling the Division I football season or some conferences opting out. And then changing their minds leading to the idiotic end to the Big Ten season where NCAA franchise Ohio State was allowed to jump over other schools who’d played more games, to play in the Big Ten championship and ultimately be put into the College Football Playoffs. In a year where the overriding theme was equality which never played out more on the streets and social media but not on the football field. Especially in a particularly brutal political environment where Covid deniers wanted full stadiums while the more cautious wanted to protect the treasure of youth. Different sides of our national identity came to the fore and it was ugly and violent even when the best thing for the country was to come together and fight the thing that was keeping us apart. It turns out it was more than a Pandemic.

Yet we found a way to fight through the nonsense and have a stellar NFL season culminating in another Super bowl involving Tom Brady and something no one has ever seen in football history which is a Super bowl played at a team’s home field. And it only got better. MLB started Spring Training on time and so far (knock on wood) Covid hasn’t been too much of a disruption and then there was the NCAA Tournament. No matter the circumstance this was one of the best tournaments to ever take place! While there weren’t many buzzer beaters there were a number of teams that shocked the field or just showed they weren’t to be taken for granted. Grand Canyon University, Oregon State, and of course UCLA. Gonzaga going for the first undefeated season in decades. Baylor bringing Scott Drew’s dreams to fruition with a National Title. A doosey of a final four weekend with an awesome finish to one of the best games in tournament history between Gonzaga and UCLA whom no one thought it would go to overtime or even double overtime if not for a miraculous shot at the buzzer. No one could have drawn it up or defended it better, the final shot which left me with my jaw on the floor knowing that UCLA was a play in team that got all the way to the final four. Who does that?

So what happens now? Seniors get an extra year of eligibility because of Covid. Minor changes in future professional sports including a 17 game season in the NFL? Changes in the playoff system? We’ve already seen that an entire baseball league hitting DH doesn’t work and thank goodness for not continuing with the automatic runner in extra innings. And finally full stands for all events. However, it is not as simple as it is written Monday morning quarterback style. With strict voting laws being protested to the point MLB has moved the All- Star game out of Georgia. And Donald Trump stupidly suggesting a boycott when there are hardly anyone in the stands already.

Another period where sports came to our aid in tough times but the underlying epidemic of young black men and women being shot and protests over it amounted to nothing though some would say the conviction of Dereck Chauvin would make the suffering of the past year worth it. Some would say it is only the beginning. It is a matter of forgetting, which is what sports has done for us through the years. The unpredictability of it all without educated individuals butchering the English language and unnecessary bad language in a time when there is more access to younger generations to see adults behaving badly. Never in my life would I imagine an athlete swearing at the President of the United States no matter how wrong he is.  G©