Birthday dreams and Hawkeye pain... and opportunities for great stories

It was a fun evening yesterday, celebrating Anna's 17th birthday at her parents' home, enjoying a lasagna dinner with tiramisu dessert prepared by Ian, her dad. We talked a bit about her latest story assignment for the school magazine on the tenth anniversary of the Dec. 13, 2013 shooting that left one innocent young woman dead and her murderer (another senior at Arapahoe) dead by his own hand. She has already conducted a couple in-depth interviews with some teachers who vividly recall the events, having lived through them.

Well, that discussion doesn't sound like much fun, now that I think about it, but it's always great to have a serious discussion about how to report on something with my granddaughters. After all, that allows me to revisit what I did for decades with my own journalism students. 

Granddaughter #1, Grace, just had her 27th news story published on The Daily Iowan news site, with at least of three of those articles also appearing the print version of the paper. For all her earlier education, including four years as part of various aspects of the Arapahoe media program, she is still learning to report and write "news," and that is a great reminder that high school just can't be the end of our educations. We need guided practice and repetition and feedback and continuous motivation. 

BTW: I think Grace gets paid $15 per story, no matter the length or time involved in reporting, which means she has earned a whopping $405 total this semester due to her efforts. That's better than the zero dollars she earned during four years of high school journalism, but still... That doesn't amount to a very good part time job.

But she is learning to write, on the job and in public, and she continues to improve and anticipate what to ask and where to go for information. That is priceless.

Anna is on a similar journey, but this coverage of a tragic anniversary and how the school community has found ways to become stronger, more supportive, and generally friendlier is likely her most important assignment in the past two years plus. She is doing real journalism, all while balancing a full load of challenging classes. 

There was a negative last night, unfortunately. The Iowa women lost their first game of the year to a very physical Kansas State team, with All-World Caitlin Clark having an off night. There are rumors online that she was ill, which might explain her fatigue and flat performance. She tried to play through it but to no avail. 

Grace was in the sell-out crowd and I'm sure felt some disappointment. But life does not spin out in a continuous upward line of a graph. It's good to be reminded of that and of how disappointments can often become key steps that lead to future successes. 

Iowa fans are all too aware of the ups and downs of athletics. For instance, the football team's best player, Cooper Dejean, broke some bones in his foot during practice this week and will miss the rest of the season. His absence could be an excuse if the Hawks drop tomorrow's home finale with Illinois, of course. But it could be that his replacement will rise to the occasion and that others will pick up the slack.

Ms. Clark will have better days -- it's hard to imagine a worse one for her -- so things will only get brighter for the women. 

Anna will encounter unforeseen difficulties in putting her two-or three-spread coverage onto the pages of The Herald. Sources will flake. Photos will not be found from a decade ago (she learned that the hard drive which contained the back up images was stolen). But I suspect Arapahoe readers will be fascinated to learn more about a traumatic story and how their community rallied. 

It's not much of a story when there are no challenges to overcome. And overcoming those challenges is key to having some fun.

Is it a little pitiful to look forward to far-off games on TV?

As we head into winter, with less daylight and chilly temps and a renewed appreciation for our little fireplace in the living room, Kathleen and I welcome the somewhat regular televised Iowa basketball games into our home.

Last night it was the women scrapping their way to victory over a very strong Virginia Tech team (both teams made the Final Four last spring), with Caitlin Clark having an "off night" and still producing 44 points. She could easily have had double digit assists, as well, but we had some difficulties with layups. Some of that could have been due to a 6'6" center altering shots.

The game was played in North Carolina, billed as a special event, and it drew not only a national audience on ESPN but over 15,000 to the arena. This was reportedly the largest crowd for a women's basketball game ever in the Tar Heel state. The TV announcers claimed that not only are all Iowa women's games in Carver Hawkeye sold out, but that many of their away games are also selling out. 

They called this "Clarkenomics," based on the incredible revenue that all those sold out games and events can generate. Last night's game produced nearly $3 million in associated revenue for the Charlotte area and each team was paid a cool $150,000 just to show up and play. In November. It's a bit nutty.

We have joined on the screen so many of those Iowa women over the past decade (thanks, Big Ten Network) that we feel we have some sort of relationship to favorites like Kate Martin... I know. It's completely one-sided and artificial, but we honestly care, and not just about victories. 

It's a weird sort of bonus to know that Grace will be attending most home games this season, enjoying some of the same excitement as we used to for many years with our own season tickets (but only to men's games, back then).

Speaking of men, the men's team has its second game tonight and we haven't seen them play as of yet, but there are some new players, including some freshmen, and it won't be long until we are in the grasp of the full range of emotions as the team battles with its opponents. 

I'm not sure I can measure the feeling, but I am certain that I am a little bit happier after an Iowa win than after a loss. It's not logical, but it's clear that winning beats losing. I know. That's quite the insight.

The same lack of logic will apply to tomorrow's Iowa-Rutgers football game, pitting two mediocre teams (though the Hawks are 7-2 and could end up playing in the Big Ten Championship game in December) with two unproductive offenses against one another. 

The best athletic teams (like the Iowa women) combine "style points" with the actual scores to provide entertainment to vast crowds. But the beauty of sports is that one of the teams will win (the exception is regular season soccer, of course), no matter the skill levels and entertainment value. 

I wouldn't say I "live and die" with the Hawks -- after all, I suffered through 17 consecutive losing seasons in the woe begotten 1970s and 80s... and survived -- but I continue to root strongly for teams I only see on TV. Old habits die hard, I suppose.

As an Iowa fan, I am well aware that my dreams will always be squashed at some point. That one of my teams will underperform at the exact wrong time and not reach the pinnacle. But Iowa fans relish being the underdog, the underappreciated... at least a bit. 

The state of Iowa in the past decade has disappointed me in so many ways, mostly politically, but at least there are athletics, and not just at UI. Another bleak winter is looming, but Iowa fans can join in a mystical communion, warmed by TV screens.

Now, if only some of our friends and neighbors could shake the Trump cult. In the meantime... Go, Hawks!

Sports provide terrific material for storytelling

Another high school volleyball season ended for granddaughter Anna last night, with the team dropping both matches in its three-team regional. The first contest was with the fifth-seed Mountain Vista, which is led by Bridget Malone, who has played for U.S. national teams and was terrific. The PA announcer must have gotten a bit bored repeating "Bridget Malone... KILL!" I certainly did.

She is a six-foot junior who can jump. Her mother played volleyball for Providence and her father happens to be the coach of the Denver Nuggets. She is gifted genetically. Vista is blessed to have her live in its attendance area. I felt lucky to see her in action.

The second match was with an opponent, Lakewood, that was not all that better than Arapahoe, though seeded higher, 20 to 31 (of 36 total in 5A). That match started so well, with Anna's team racing out to an 18-9 lead. Then things fell apart, with Lakewood storming back to win 25-23... and the Warriors seemed to lose interest in continuing their mediocre season, dropping the final two sets.

Kathleen and I did what we have done over a dozen times this fall: sit on uncomfortable bleachers in a poorly lighted gym, this time with bizarre and deafening country rock music played every time there was a timeout. There oughta be a law...

Anna plays middle hitter and only in the front row, so she is on the bench about half of each match. You would think that I would lose interest and woolgather much the way I do during most sermons at church (another topic entirely), but the longer the season went on, the more I came to care about the performances and emotions and personalities of the players. I don't really know any of them, and yet...

There is the sophomore libero, who spent the first half of the season on the bench behind a senior... until the senior messed up her knee and had to have surgery. From that point, she rarely left the court. Last night, during the very first point of the very first set, she hustled so hard after an errant dig that she slid head-on into the back wall of the gym. Luckily, it was padded, but she clearly was concussed (and her neck obviously was jolted). She shook it off, as athletes universally attempt to do, and stayed in the match. But she made uncharacteristically bad plays in the back row, was increasingly inconsistent with her serving (hitting half of them into the net), and was generally moving erratically. 

It was clear from the top row of the bleachers that she needed to go to urgent care but there seemed to be no trainers in the gym -- during a playoff? -- and the coaches were eager to take her at her word that she was fine. After all, there were no kids sitting on the bench who could replace her. 

So much for the cliche promises that coaches always make about keeping the health and safety of their players foremost in their minds. In the end, not having her parents take her to the emergency room mattered not a whit; we lost all six sets in the two matches.

I hope her folks eventually had her checked out.

Anna suffered her own (thankfully) minor injury, though not sports-related, as she got her pinkie caught in her car door as she ran out between matches for something... and suddenly we saw some tape around two fingers on her left hand. There was a small cut, apparently, and it didn't affect her play. But I couldn't help focus on that bit of white tape during the entire second match. She and her parents came for pizza at our house after the matches and she seemed fine, inhaling pepperoni as if she would never eat again. I guess I shouldn't have worried, I guess. 

I could share impressions of each player on the team, based on her play and her attitude on the bench and with teammates. They all experienced moments of greatness and humiliation (more of the latter, I'm afraid) during the two-month season. Part of that is due to the constant motion and many points volleyball demands. But that mix of highs and lows, joy and sorrow, is why we love sports, even old-timers fidgeting on bleachers designed to test even the strongest spines and most cushioned buttocks. 

We get drawn in over time, sometimes without wishing to be. We see fellow humans trying to do something really hard, often failing and sometimes succeeding. We don't even need to fully understand the rules -- I never did figure out the bizarre substitution rules for volleyball which seemed to force some players to wait for the floor official to wave a player onto the court while others simply ran in and replaced someone. It was like some intricate dance and the Arapahoe coach choreographed things to the point that nearly everyone on the 12-player team participated in each set. The team remained mediocre despite these intricacies.

There were major characters, of course, such as the 6'3" junior who sparked gasps with her occasional thunderous kills, but they were all compelling characters, even the minor characters who appeared only to serve before returning to the bench. And compelling characters are the heart of great stories.

That's why I am constantly urging young journalists to spend some time observing practices and games and finding ways to share the stories of school teams. My nudges don't seem to be making much headway, if the papers and websites I judge are any indication. 

But sports are still the most fertile area for writers wanting to tell stories.