[NU Sports] Please unsubscribe me. Thanks.

[Jeff Beamsley]

IMHO, what has distinguished this list over the 10 or so (can it really have
been that long) years of it's existence is the quality of the discussion.
It is a real challenge for Mike or anyone to encourage free speech,
discourage infantile flaming, have an opinion, while at the same time not
seem like he is always taking sides.   

I agree that the past couple of years the discussions have become more
polarized, perhaps reflecting what's been going on in the country.  We are
less patient and considerate of each other and more willing to characterize
people we disagree with in unflattering disrespectful ways.  I certainly
have been guilty of that, though offline I've at least sought forgiveness
for some of the hurt that I may have thoughtlessly caused online.

It is sad to see people leave this list.  It is even sadder to see people
ridiculed because they voice a minority opinion.  But the worst outcome
would be a list where there was no disagreement at all.  So I've made it my
mission to regularly and arbitrarily disagree, if only to prevent this list
from slipping into Pleasantville.  If that bothers folks, I guess you'll
just have to say so. <g> 

Thanks Mike for your efforts to keep this list interesting (at least for me
<g>).

Jeff








-----Original Message-----
From: nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com [mailto:nwu-sports-bounces at tssi.com] On
Behalf Of Jonathan Michael Hawkins
Sent: Monday, February 06, 2006 3:27 PM
To: nwu-sports at tssi.com
Subject: Re: [NU Sports] Please unsubscribe me. Thanks.

On Mon, 6 Feb 2006, Martinitis at aol.com wrote:
> And they are getting just too negative for my blood as well.

<sigh>

Well, that's true.  Between focusing entirely on "The Curse" and the "I Love
Jay Mariotti and Rick Telander [oh, and Fire Randy Walker, too!]" 
Brigade, I'm not sure how much of a "fan" list this is any more.  It used to
be like 100% fan.  Maybe now it's 70% fan, 30% "I went to NU and have found
that incessant negativity wins friends and influences people".

I'm pretty sure I could write "the weather's so nice out today" on the list
and someone would come back with "No thanks to Randy Walker.  And if Mark
Murphy doesn't fire him soon I'm going to continue to give my West Lot pass
away to Michigan fans". ;-)

Okay, enough joking about.  For real, here's some positive ideas and
commentary:

It's worth noting, and this is partially my fault, no one wrote in to talk
about our 'Cats incredibly heart-filled performance on Saturday against
Michigan State at home.  I'll try to rectify that - I was at the game and
had a great time.

We lost, but I'm not sure I've ever seen a time when everyone played with
the kind of guts and emotion that were displayed out there on the court on
Saturday night.

We couldn't seem to get our open shots to fall as much as we wanted them to,
but we did create those open looks and also gave MSU fits on defense. 
Most of the guys out there looked like they had the fires of hell behind
their eyes.  At one point Cote was bending over under the basket to tie his
shoe or something, MSU had gotten the rebound and was about to go down the
court, and Vedran shoved some MSU guy who'd pissed him off.  The Spartan guy
goes flying *over* Cote and lands in a heap.  No call. 
Vedran was on fire with anger and passion.  He fouled out with 2 minutes
left, leaving to a prolonged standing ovation.

That no-call was typical of the evening, actually.  The referees were just
horrid on both sides of the ball, but it certainly made the game more
interesting.  Levels of ire increased on both sides due to the poor
officiating, to the point where MSU tried to get into a fight with us at the
end of the first half.  Michael Jenkins got a regular old foul (under the
limit), but then there were offsetting technicals for fighting after the
foul, and then one of the MSU assistant coaches got into it, which resulted
in them having two Ts to our one.  So Vedran took two free throws and made
them both.  Michigan State got the ball after that for Jenkins' 
original foul.  We were quite amused.

Moore drained some nice looking threes, and I think Carmody may be warming
up to Cote - some of the postgame comments to Eanet indicated that we should
probably see much more play time out of him in the rest of the season.  He
went from 6 minutes vs. Indiana to 19 in Saturday's game.

Usually losses just crush me and leave me feeling tired and depressed, but
this one was so entertaining and scrappy I just couldn't feel bad about it.

Hopefully we can translate that passion and intensity into some wins against
lesser Big Ten teams than MSU.

Go 'Cats,

Jonathan

--
Jonathan Michael Hawkins
<http://www.jomiha.com>

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