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Strike the last post. In addition to Texas (h/t MMM), Indiana - Indiana! How did I miss that? - has won 5 national championships in the past twenty years...and in IU's case in one sport (men's soccer).
My apologies to all.
Trivial Pursuit Question: Only five six NCAA Division I schools have won at least five men's national championships over the past 20 years. Can you name them?
(Answer: UCLA, USC, Stanford, Wisconsin, Arkansas, and...Pepperdine.)
Go to this page, and scroll down until you reach #36 and #37 on Forde's column. Now look at the photo. Now look at the word in small type directly above the photo. Poor word choice? Forde doesn't seem to know that she's actually one of our biggest donors...the big, flashy new LCD scoreboard at the baseball stadium was donated by her.
FWIW, we were at this game, and what this photo doesn't show is that sitting directly behind her was Kenny G. And directly to the left of them (also unpictured) was an elder from our church and his wife...once again proving what an odd place this is. Pamela, Kenny G, and my church elder. All rooting for the same (pretty bad this year) team.
Perfectly normal.
Maybe doing the right thing will cost the Hoosiers on the court. Maybe the season will be lost.
But in the end, for Indiana, its character will be revealed – which means so much more has been gained.
(h/t KM)
This is a really nice piece on our old new coach.
Trolling about for information about tonight's IU-Purdue game, I stumbled upon this enjoyable (for me) article in the Indiana Daily Student. I've only sort of met Chuck Crabb once.
When I was in school at IU, I would often try to take out-of-town guests to Assembly Hall on the chance that the doors to the court would be unlocked. This worked for me the first time I visited Bloomington. Long before C and I dated, the time I went to IU to preview the campus while I was still a Harding student she gave me a tour of the town. We went by Assembly Hall, and though it was empty, someone had accidentally left the doors unlocked to the actual arena. I remember walking with C down onto the floor of the basketball court, and when I stood at center court (on the logo with the outline of the state of Indiana known to anyone who has watched an IU home game on TV) and looked up at the five national championship banners and roughly 18,000 crimson seats under flood lights I think I made up my mind on the spot to become a Hoosier. It was as if the heavens opened and my future was revealed to me. At that moment, there was no way of knowing that eventually I would attend numerous basketball games in that very building, that I would receive a graduate degree at a graduation in that building, that I would be married in the church across the street from that building, and one day I would see my wife hooded for her PhD in that building. At the time I just thought the banners were cool.
Anyway, I tried to replicate that experience with as many out-of-town guests as I could (without the part involving C, of course), and one time I took some out-of-towners (My parents? I can't remember. It may have been Shaun or Milligan. Who knows) into Assembly Hall one afternoon. All the doors to the arena were locked, and for some reason I mustered the courage to go into one of the athletic department offices to ask an adminstrative assistant if I could unlock the arena doors for my out-of-town guests (what was I thinking? In hindsight, what hubris.) Anyway, the office I found didn't have anyone manning the administrative assistant's desk at that moment, and out of one of the offices came Chuck Crabb - the Chuck Crabb, the voice everyone at IU knows. I asked him if he would unlock the doors of the arena (again, what hubris) and he looked at me and said "sure, why not."
In hindsight, a pretty random and odd act of kindness, but one that came to mind when I read that story.
If I hear one more politician say that our economy is weak because it is over-regulated, I think I'll scream at the television. Isn't it clear - crystal clear - that if all this comes to pass it's because the banking and credit markets weren't regulated enough? The whole mess we're in (our will be in soon) stems from the fact that too many Americans believed they could live above their means and an unregulated credit market was all too excited to make a quick buck by securitizing those loans instead of planning for sustainable, long-term growth. It also doesn't help to have a President who, during a time of war, encouraged us all to do our patriotic duty by going shopping. Maybe some people need to do less shopping.
I also place partial blame for the housing credit crunch on HGTV, but that's for another diatribe.
ps. Also, don't get me started on the stupidity of the economic stimulus package.
But on the other hand...
This is homecoming weekend in Malibu, and while the sunny skies and relatively warm temps might make you think that there are few other places I'd rather be, let there be no doubt: I would much prefer to be in Bloomington, Indiana this weekend. Why?
Two reasons: ESPN College Gameday and Prairie Home Companion. The same day. The same campus. (I wonder if this has ever happened before.) I somehow doubt there are few other small towns in this country that would enthusiastically welcome both shows. The PHC blurb:
This week on A Prairie Home Companion, we'll visit the Indiana University Auditorium in beautiful Bloomington (a.k.a. Tree City) for a rapid radio immersion into the many young talents in and around the distinguished Jacobs School of Music. With special guests, the Indiana University Violin Virtuosi, a unique collection of fifteen gifted violinists between the ages of 11 and 18, performing as soloists and a violin ensemble, and directed by Professor Mimi Zweig. We'll also have baritone Aleksey Bogdanov, violinist Esther Kim, Pianist Ignasi Cambra, and a colorful student pit orchestra ready to bravely play, while gummi bears and soda pop are spilled steadily onto their heads, from the seats high above. Also with us, the Royal Academy of Radio Actors: Tim Russell, Sue Scott, and Fred Newman, The Guy's All-Star Shoe Band with old soft shoe Andy Stein, and The News From Lake Wobegon.
And on the basketball side of the equation, one could see big scandal and coaching drama. What a weekend!
In the "If you live long enough you'll see everything" category, one of my school's most vaunted conservatives writes an awfully nice piece on Obama for Slate.
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