March Gladness

The girls love playing basketball, which is great, and that love of playing it has lately extended into loving to watch it too. We attended a bunch of Northfield high-school games this winter and even went to Minneapolis to see a Timberwolves game in February.

This week, they’ve been getting into the NCAA men’s tournament, which they both simply call “Marchmadness,” as if it were actually a different sport than basketball. We filled out tournament brackets, which was fun and a little bit educational, and have watched bits of a few first-round games, including both of the overtime periods that Little Rock needed to beat Purdue.

All day today, I looked forward to sitting on the sofa tonight with the girls and watching whatever game came on. In one of those all-too-rare cases of parenting where the reality matches the expectation, we did just that, taking in Stephen F. Austin’s upset of West Virginia. The game was full of hard defense, good shooting by SFA’s amazingly-bearded Thomas Walkup

Mar 18, 2016; Brooklyn, NY, USA; Stephen F. Austin Lumberjacks forward Thomas Walkup (middle) drives to the basket against West Virginia Mountaineers players Elijah Macon (45) , Esa Ahmad (23) and Jonathan Holton (1) in the first half in the first round of the 2016 NCAA Tournament at Barclays Center. Mandatory Credit: Robert Deutsch-USA TODAY Sports
Stephen F. Austin Lumberjacks forward Thomas Walkup. March 18, 2016; Brooklyn, NY, USA; mandatory credit: Robert Deutsch-USA TODAY Sports

and enough steals by SFA to make WVU look like tourists who had wandered into a pickpockets’ convention. We also had an unnecessary bowl of popcorn, some fizzy drinks, and lots of crazy conversation. It was a blast.

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