NCAA Final Four- March Madness - Basketball

Since Texas Tech lost to Villanova in the Elite Eight, I am not really interested in watching the Final Four games, which consist of Loyola-Chicago against Michigan, and Villanova against Kansas.  Today, Michigan won against Loyola-Chicago.  My hope is that Villanova will win against Kansas, and win the championship, so Texas Tech can say they lost to the champions.  Many people in Lubbock feel the same way!

West Texas Basketball

Texas is known for its love of football, and West Texas is no different than any other part of the state.

But guess what, West Texas has a long history of basketball excellence.  One place it started is with the Wayland Baptist Flying Queens , who are in the NAIA tournament 2018. The Texas Tech Lady Raiders won the 1993 NCAA Women's Basketball Championship. The South Plains College Basketball history is amazing. And for the 6th year in a row, the National Junior College Athletic Association Division 1 championship will be held in Lubbock.  And in recent years,  the Lubbock Christian University Women's Basketball team  won their championship in 2016 and are in the running again this year.   And, this year, the Texas Tech Red Raiders are in the NCAA tournament.  



Go basketball!  

25th Anniversay

2018 is the 25th anniversary of the Texas Tech Lady Raiders winning the NCAA National Championship Texas Tech basketball history.  The university has started celebrating this fall, although the game happened in 1993 in the spring.

At various Lady Raider games this year, the National Championship team, Coach Marsha Sharp, and Sheryl Swoopes have been honored.  So it was today at the throw back game. Of course, you would expect that.  Why celebrate if the stars cannot be there. 

Football Season Opening Night

I am not the kind of football https://www.nfl.com/ fan who watches every game, or even necessarily the opening game of the season.  But I do watch the New England Patriots play when their games are available to me.  So, tonight, I am watching the opening game with the Patriots playing against the Kansas City Chiefs. I don't care what anyone says, I am a Tom Brady fan http://www.nfl.com/player/tombrady/2504211/profile! 

A second reason to watch is that the Kansas City Chiefs is this is the team the Pat Mahomes http://www.nfl.com/player/patrickmahomes/2558125/profile is on. He was the star quarterback of the Texas Tech Red Raiders http://www.texastech.com/ for the last few seasons.  

A third reason to  watch is that Danny Amendola  http://www.nfl.com/player/dannyamendola/2649/profile is a starter for the Patriots.  Amendola was also a star for Texas Tech.

World Series, Game 7

This has been a great World Series http://mlb.mlb.com/home.  There are lots of reasons to cheer for either team to win.  I think, this year, Major League Baseball has won with this World Series!  I am going to publish this before the last game is final.  Ultimately, I just really like the history of this series, and the fact the games have generally been close and well played.  Yeah Baseball!

Texas Tech NCAA Baseball

Texas Tech NCAA Baseball has advanced to the final 8 of the NCAA World Series of College Baseball.  The series will be played in Omaha, Nebraska.  This is the second time in 3 years that Tech has advanced to the World Series.  They have done well the last 3 years, have a great coach in Tim Tadlock http://www.texastech.com/sports/m-basebl/mtt/tim_tadlock_786414.html, and have World Series experience.  This is great news for Texas Tech.  Go Tech!

The American League Championship Series

So, I did not watch all of the games between the Kansas City Royals http://kansascity.royals.mlb.com/index.jsp?c_id=kc&tcid=mm_mlb_sitelist and the Toronto Blue Jays http://toronto.bluejays.mlb.com/index.jsp?c_id=tor.  I would have preferred that the Blue Jays won, but it was not the case.

I was watching the celebration on the field (while the team locker room or clubhouse was being prepared for the champagne celebration). The thing that impressed me the most was that how many small children were present with their fathers during the celebration. That was so impressive. I think it says something about the values of the team members.

It was a good series.  It was a good game. 

NASCAR

I like NASCAR http://www.nascar.com/en_us/sprint-cup-series.html. I used to be a die hard NASCAR fan.  Some of my heart died with the death of Dale Earnhardt Sr. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Earnhardt. 

Some of my heart died when NASCAR started changing things:  racing on Mother's Day weekend, decreasing the Firecracker 600 to a 400 mile race, closing the races at the short tracks such as at North Wilkesboro and Hickory, adding a lot of " cookie cutter race tracks" that were the boring same run, week after week, and changing the championship formula. The change in the championship formula was the last straw: They "invented" The Chase to try to make the race for the championship more exciting.  It did not do what they wanted.  The formula before the first change was points for leading a lap, points for winning, and points for finishing place.  The problem was that sometimes some driver could have a really, really good year, finish high in a lot of races, but not win any races.  The answer was simple:   increase the additional points for winning from 5 to 20.  Make it substantial.

No, NASCAR did all these other machinations to make the championship race more interesting. But, it did not succeed. So, now, instead of just worrying about points, they now also put some emphasis on winning.  Get rid of "the chase."  Go back to the points system, with large number of points for winning. It will take care of the problem, and I will be more interested in NASCAR.

But not until they return to some traditions: no racing on Easter weekend (period, including Saturday.) No racing on Mother's Day weekend at all.  More short tracks.  Lower ticket prices.

NASCAR has done well to keep the drivers and pit crews accessible to fans.  But that is probably the only thing they have maintained.  

National Hockey League Championship

I changed the channel to watch the local NBC affiliate, KCBD, Channel 11 http://www.kcbd.com/weather.  Well, I got to see the celebration of the National Hockey League champion, the Chicago Black Hawks http://www.nhl.com/.  Of all the sports, hockey is one I do not spend much time watching.  But, I like celebrations, and I watched this one.  It was okay.

Congratulations, Chicago Black Hawks!

Championship Character - Go Notre Dame!

I watched the end of game one of the NCAA Women's Basketball Final Four between South Carolina and Notre Dame http://espn.go.com/womens-college-basketball/tournament/2015/story/_/id/12624848/how-notre-dame-fighting-irish-beat-south-carolina-gamecocks.  It was a close game, and South Carolina lead only briefly in the final minutes of the game.  But Notre Dame came back, and won the game.

After the game was over, a South Carolina player, who missed a shot that might have given them the lead, was inconsolable. Some Notre Dame players came over to comfort her!  That was amazing and heart-touching to me.  Those players showed true championship character!  It does not matter who wins the final game. Those Notre Dame players are the true champions! What character!

Go, Notre Dame!

The World Series

I like baseball, but I usually only watch it if it is a team that I really like. Mostly the Red Sox, the Yankees, and now, the Diamondbacks.  None of "my" teams made to the post season, and I am not a San Francisco Giants fan, nor a Kansas City Royals fan.

But I am a fan of the underdog, and the Royals are the underdog: It has been since 1985 since they were in the World Series.  So, here I am, watching the 7th game of the 2014 World Series.  Although the individual games have not been especially close, the series has stayed close.  Getting to game 7 is good. 

I will post this before the winner is decided.  Go baseball!