Bucket List

If you are reading this I’m confident that you are a sports fan. As a sports fan, I’m also confident that you have a sports “bucket list”. Each of us have  special sporting events that we set our heart on trying to get to as we go thru our lifetime. Some of us are on the “back nine” and, hopefully, have been fortunate to have experienced some of the events on our bucket list. Some of you may be just striking out on your journey and still have many of those special events to look forward to. For me, it has been a remarkable sports journey. I have been blessed.

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to check another “bucket list” sports experience off my list. Diane, my wife of 53 years, and I went to South Bend to see a Notre Dame home football game. I am a nostalgic person by nature, especially when it comes to sports so going to a place like Notre Dame that began playing football in the late 1880’s and is recognized as THE iconic college football program was awesome. Knute Rockne, the “Four Horseman”, “The Gipper”, Frank Leahy, the “Ara Era”, and just so much history. Touring the Notre Dame campus, with Bridget are granddaughter as our guide, and soaking in all the history of the school and football program was very special. It is, arguably, the most unique college atmosphere of any school in the country. All of that on a gray, cool Fall weekend in South Bend got me to thinking about what sporting events I had been blessed to witness. These are the highlights. Truly, a “bucket list” for a sports fan!

I have been to two World Series, most recently with my son in 2011. We were at game six between the Texas Rangers and the St. Louis Cardinals, my team, when they came back and won in what may have been one of the greatest comeback wins in the history of the WS. They also won game seven.

I have been to several Stanley Cup hockey games, including two of the three Tampa Bay Lightning championships.

Growing up in basketball crazy Illinois I thought it would be awesome to play in Madison Square Garden in New York. I didn’t get to play there but I was on the bench, as a coach, for four games when Oral Roberts University played there. (I did take a few shots on that iconic court.) As much as Notre Dame is the mecca of college football I think the mecca of college basketball is one of these six places. I have coached or been a fan in four of those places; Duke, Kansas, Kentucky, and UCLA. Indiana and North Carolina would have to be included with the other four as college basketball “blue bloods”. (I haven’t been to either one, yet.)

Attending the Final Four is my favorite sporting event, I have been to six. It is hard to pick my favorite, but it would be between UCLA’s championship in St. Louis when Walton was almost perfect or when Indiana WAS perfect in 1975-76 in Philadelphia. (The Hoosiers beat Michigan in the finals, capping off a perfect season at 31-0.)

I went to Super Bowl VII in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in 1973. Coach Trickey, ORU head coach, and I were in LA recruiting and at the last minute got tickets for the game. We left at half-time to catch our flight back to Tulsa. The Miami Dolphins beat the Washington Redskins 14-7 to stay undefeated. (The Dolphins are still the only NFL team to not lose a game all season and win the Super Bowl.)

As a high school basketball player that grew up in Galatia, Il. I thought the “ultimate” sporting event was the Illinois HS State Basketball Tournament and it was. I have been to more than I can remember and they were all special. That was back when Illinois had just one class and 16,000 screaming fans filled up Assembly Hall.

In 2002, Diane and I had the opportunity to attend a practice round at Augusta National before Tiger Woods won his third Master’s. TV does not do that beautiful course justice.

I have seen NBA games in St. Louis, LA, Chicago, Cincinnati, Orlando, and Atlanta. In my book, “The G.O.A.T.: The Quest To Find the Best”, I say that I have seen everyone of the top 75 greatest players of all time play, many of them in person.

I have been so blessed in these 80 years. I’m not done, I still have a couple things on my bucket list. I would like to see the “greatest spectacle in racing”, the Indianapolis 500, and a college basketball game at Indiana University.

At this time of the year I can’t help but think of that classic movie made in 1946 “It’s A Wonderful Life”. (That could be my life’s theme.) I was two when it came out. (Winter solstice baby.)

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