My friend, Julie, and I must be crazy. Yesterday we headed out of town at 5:00pm for Stillwater...even though we were listening to weather reports saying there were severe thunderstorms and even tornadoes the whole way. So we drove for about two hours in the rain...And for two more hours in the pouring rain on the way home. With a three-year-old in the back seat. (He was very good, though.)
Why did we do this? For basketball, of course. No, not OSU basketball. Don't you know me at all?!? We went for Hillcat basketball. For the second year in a row, our men's team played OSU in an exhibition game at Gallagher-Iba. I had never been to a "real" game. (And by "real" I mean a big-time-NCAA-D1-basketball-school game.) They do it up right there. I've always heard how loud that arena is and how fun those games are. Last night it was by no means full...far from it. But it was still pretty loud. I can't even imagine what it's like when it's packed!
Because Julie is awesome (and has worked her tail off for the athletes), she's "in" with the athletic department. So Coach Williams called her last week and asked if she wanted two free tickets. I was already planning to go with her to the game, and her husband couldn't go so...I got to sit in floor seats right behind our bench for free. Yay! Thanks, Coach.
Our guys played so hard the entire game. Ended up scoring 75 points, which isn't too bad. The number of points we gave up is pretty bad, though, so I'm not going to publish it. If you really feel the need to know, I'll let you dig that info up yourself. Our guys were getting so frustrated. It seemed like everything they did wasn't working. OSU, on the other hand, could just glance at the basket and the ball, of its own free will, jumped through the hoop. I was really proud of our guys, though, because they never quit playing. It was good for them. Made it obvious what they need to work on as the season gets started and we start playing teams in our conference.
Speaking of our conference, our men are ranked #3. This is remarkable for a couple reasons. One, this is only our second year of competition. And two, our conference is widely regarded as the toughest in the nation. OCU is ranked #1 in the conference, and they are the two-year defending national champs. They are ranked #1 in the NAIA pre-season rankings. OBU is ranked #2 in the conference, and they lost out of the national tourney in the quarter-finals last year. They're ranked #7 in the NAIA pre-season Top 25.
Even more remarkable is this: RSU has been voted #20 in the NAIA pre-season Top 25!
This weekend is Homecoming (our second ever). I wasn't in town last year, so this is my first. Can't wait! If you're in or near town, you should come...It'll be fun!
Go Hillcats!
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