Thanks to Murray State and UK, this is the year Adam Crawford quit watching college basketball. Forever. And you can’t make him go back!
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That’s it. I’m done. This year alone I nearly had three heart attacks, and I’m only 26.
When the merry month of March started, I had beautiful golden locks. Now, as I look in the mirror to brush my teeth, there are a larger number of bristles gently massaging my teeth than there are hairs on my head.
It all started wonderful. My Cats were entering SEC tournament 32-0, and my Murray State Racers entered the OVC championship game on a 25 game winning streak. Then, at the last minute, some guy from Belmont decided he wanted his moment of glory in the last seconds of a game inevitably dashing all hopes and dreams for my beloved Racers.
Boom—just like that Racers meaningful postseason is over. Heart attack number one and hairs number 1-100,000.
♦◊♦
Two weeks later.
Racers are in the NIT, grooving along after throwing a beating to Tulsa expecting to beat Old Dominion by a cool 8-10 points. Racers play terrible in the second half of the ball game but somehow manage to cut a 15 point lead with less than three minutes to go in the game.
Jeffrey Moss sinks a miracle 3-pointer after multiple missed attempts from the Racer offense and gives hope to what seemed like a hopeless game. Just as the game seemed to be heading into overtime, the resident freak-athlete, Trey Freeman, scrambles down the court and throws up a shot from the press table only to see it bank off the glass and score the winning 3-pointer.
Heart attach number two, and hairs number 100,001-350,000—gone.
Notre Dame-UK, last week. I’m sitting in my house, watching the Irish beat up on my Cats. Thinking to myself, There’s no way we can lose to the Irish. No Way! And we didn’t, but only because Andrew Harrison hit two of the most important free throws of his life did the Cats survive.
Heart attack number three, and hairs number 350,001-I lost count.
♦◊♦
I did not have a heart attack when Wisconsin picked apart my precious Wildcats. I was too far gone by then.
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I did not have a heart attack when Wisconsin picked apart my precious Wildcats. I was too far gone by then. The first half provided ample foreshadowing for the end of the game. The Cats played sloppy basketball, tripping over each other at the top of the key and on the inbounds. Fumbled rebounds as if they were trying to hold on to a medicine ball. It was all there.
But alas, my radical reaction to quit college basketball is not simply based on this postseason. It goes way back.
In 2011 I was at a field exercise with the Army. It just so happened that our field time had been scheduled during the Final Four (dumb luck). The night UK was to play UCONN all 120 cadets of the Wildcat Battalion huddled into a barracks day-room and watched a projector feed us the gamecast over shaky internet. The entire game was watched on what seemed like a thirty second delay, but we had no way to confirm this observation.
The game was a slugfest as the final seconds dwindled down. The Cats would go up by two and UCONN would throw up a three. With seven seconds to go in the game the Cats were up 55-54. As UCONN tossed the ball in bounds to Kemba Walker (we need a 30 for 30 on Kemba Walker) the connection cut out and the screen went to that spinning wheel of death that is “buffering”.
The room went silent.
Thirty seconds later the connection came back but all we could see was this:
The next sound in the room was something similar to what you can imagine devastation might sound like.
♦◊♦
Even further back.
In 2010 my Cats were 19-0. Supposedly the greatest team that ever graced a college basketball floor. The team with Boogie Cousins, John Wall, Eric Bledsoe, Patrick Patterson, Darius Miller, DeAndre Liggins, Daniel Orton, and Josh Harrelson. The team had rolled through the SEC through the first half of the season.
Then came South Carolina. And Devan Downey.
Downey proceeds to go off for 30 points and the Cats lose to an unranked team for their first loss of the season.
College Basketball will be the death of me. Or, it would have been had I not decided I’m quitting.
I’m quitting college basketball from this point on. I can’t handle it anymore. I don’t want to die in front of my flat screen at the hands of someone nicknamed, “Frank the Tank”.
I can’t do it.
We were so close to having the greatest season in college basketball history (arguably).
So close.
On second thought, maybe I’ll quit next year.
Don’t judge me. I can quit whenever I want.
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Photo: Flickr/katielmasters
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