Blogger 365 Day 177 - Highlights

     Growing up in and around Pittsburgh through the course of my life I am been blessed as a sports fan to have some really great teams to root for and support.  As I have mentioned previously in this blog that for some having that level of success has brought about a certain entitlement mentality, very little appreciation for the periods of success certain teams have achieved because success is to be expected rather than cherished.  There is no enjoyment in the journey to the top of the mountain because they believe the journey starts at the top of the mountain.

     In my lifetime the Pitt football team has won a national championship, the Pittsburgh Pirates have won two World Series, the Pittsburgh Penguins have won three Stanley Cups and the Pittsburgh Steelers have won the Super Bowl 6 times.  While I have witnessed many of those moments though the wonders of TV, I have never been to any of them.  That isn't to say I haven't been fortunate, I have been to many sporting events that will leave a lasting impression on me such as seeing Pitt basketball beat Georgetown at the Civic Arena, almost a coming of age party that Pitt was ready to be a player in the Big East basketball conference, being at PNC Park for Barry Bonds's last at bats in Pittsburgh before the end of his career, having the privilege of watching Mario Lemieux play hockey numerous times, watching Greg Lloyd absolutely crush Brett Favre in a preseason game, etc.   I am sure there any many Pittsburghers like myself who could go into detail about sporting events they were at and what those events meant to them.

     Through the wonders of technology (mostly the internet and Youtube) I give you the three most memorable sporting moments I was lucky enough to be in attendance for in my lifetime.

     3)  May 17th 1999   Toronto Maple Leafs versus Pittsburgh Penguins, Eastern Conference Semifinal - Unlike previous teams in my lifetime, this particular Pittsburgh Penguins team was not one of the favorites to win a Stanley Cup.  Sure they had great players, including Jaromir Jagr and Tom Barrasso, but this was a team that was on the decline, not an upswing.  Things were even worse financially for them, enough so that winning playoff games was necessary just for the organization to balance the books with the additional gate receipts.  The Penguins entered the playoffs as the 8th seed, but managed to dispatch of the top seeded New Jersey Devils in the first round of the playoffs and the second round found them against the 4th seeded Toronto Maple Leafs.  May 17th would be game 6 of that series, Toronto led the best of seven 3 games to 2 and I would be in attendance because I was covering the game for the radio station I was working for at the time, I think we were going by the moniker of Sportsfan 1360.  My job would be to cover the game, take notes and then go into the locker room and get post game audio, which would then be cut up and used for sports updates on the station later that night and the next day.   I remember that there were so many media members there that night, many from Canada where hockey is almost like religion, that my press credential was not issued for my normal seat in the press box, but instead was in additional media seating behind the visiting goal.  The game would go into overtime and then Gary Valk happened and Pittsburgh's season would come to a close......


     2)  January 25th, 1988  Pitt Panthers versus Providence Friars   By this point in time Pitt had made itself into somewhat of a power in Big East basketball.  The Pitt team would feature two players that would get drafted by NBA teams, Charles Smith and Jerome Lane, as well as Sean Miller who has become one of the better college coaches in the country,  currently plying his trade at the University of Arizona.  On this particular night no one really expected anything historic to happen, Pitt was ranked in the top 5 teams nationally and Providence was just a middling Big East school.  Not that a Pitt win was a foregone conclusion, but expectations were such that most people in attendance were not showing up for a tussle between to epic basketball programs.  I was there because it was my freshman year at Pitt, I liked basketball and student tickets to basketball games were free, you just showed your ID at the ticket window in the student union and they gave you a seat in the student section.  But what would happen very early in this game is a highlight that would get played dozens of times over in media markets all around the world....


     I remember the game was stopped afterward for about 30 minutes, they brought out the halftime show to entertain the crowd while they replaced the now broken basketball hoop and the entire time the crowd never stopped cheering, or even sat down for that matter and when the teams came back out to restart the game, it was like Providence's will to play had just been broken, Pitt would go on to blow out the Friars 90-56.  I got back to my dorm room and my roommate came back with pieces of the shattered backboard he had picked up off of the floor, he was giving them to everyone.  I imagine I still have mine buried in a box someplace.

     3)  November 15th, 1987  Pitt Panthers versus Penn State Nittany Lions    Another game that I attended my freshman year of college.  Unlike basketball, where tickets were given for free to students, for football season student had to spend a whopping $9 and for that $9 you got a ticket to every Pitt home football game, 7 in all.  Pitt - Penn State was a rivalry that, at its peak, was one of the biggest in the country. It would have been on par with the likes of Ohio State - Michigan, Alabama - Auburn, Texas - Oklahoma, USC - UCLA.  At this point in time though the rivalry was beginning to taper off a bit, Pitt's program was down a bit and Penn State had just come off of winning a national championship the season prior.  Add to that Penn State's coach, Joe Paterno, had never lost a game at Pitt Stadium, and while hope sprung eternal that maybe things would be different this year, Pitt winning would definitely be considered an upset.  If you are a person that is into high scoring football, then this wasn't a game for you, it ended up being a defensive battle the entire game, neither team did much on offense, Pitt kicked a field goal on its first possession to go up 3-0, and that is how the score would remain until the last minute of play, when Penn State would get the ball and begin driving into Pitt territory. 


     As Billy Owens ran down the field everyone in the student section was no longer sitting, they were standing on the bleachers, trying to get a better view of what was happening.  As Owens crossed the goal line and sealed the win for Pittsburgh, the section erupted into bedlam, someone actually landed on the back of my legs, knocking me down three rows of seats into a rather attractive female.  I regret that I did not have a pick up line at the ready, I wasn't as clever then as I am now. 

    Anyway, those are the three most memorable moments that I have been fortunate enough to actually be in attendance.  Hope you enjoyed and for a change I actually blogged a little, Who'd have thunk that?