So since it’s one of my all-time favorite topics, allow me a bit more rumination… but also, as certainly almost always, allow us to apply the learning to far more than any sport, game or event of potentially perceived less significant meaning.
As the Purdue men’s basketball team walked off the court the other evening, showered by confetti intended to honor someone other than them, March’s madness came to an end at least in college basketball. Congrats to UConn’s Huskies, the dominant victor in 2024.
In an incredible season of their own, my esteemed alma mater came in second. Here’s what we learned, indeed transcending the sports world…
First, success comes in all sorts of packages. Sometimes I think we miss out on the superfluity of success in both self and others because we’ve too narrowed the definition of what success is and what it is not. Too often we’ve crafted a discernment barometer that measures outcome and accomplishment based on how we compare to someone else. And because we are not someone else, we are either lesser or more. I think our measurement of success is way too finite.
Purdue did not win it all in 2024. But suffice it to say, of the other 350 schools that are full members of Division I basketball conferences, 349 of them wish they were in Purdue’s shoes today. What a great, fantastic, successful year. Success is not limited to a few.
Look, too, on the women’s side, which saw South Carolina again cut down the nets. Caitlin Clark’s Iowa, like Purdue, was the runner up. But Clark ends her season and college career not only as the NCAA Division I all-time leading scorer, but also as one who has generated unparalleled contemporary interest in women’s basketball. That, even as a runner up, is unquestionably successful.
The stories are more. Some with noted, lesser media attention. Successful nonetheless.
Second, to be concise, quoting one of the more iconic poets of our time (thank you, Taylor), “The players gonna play, play, play, play, play, and the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.” It is fascinating to me the plethora of people who create copious cause to loathe a player on the court. There’s just something about them we don’t like.
Something they’ve said… a way they reacted… maybe just the way they play. We don’t like it. It — they — are annoying. Hence we justify the hate. Let me just say this… For the far majority of athletes, and yes, I mean the far majority, we have very little proximity. We have incredibly limited perspective. And we are basing our self-crafted hatred on an incredibly small sample size.
I get not wanting someone to do well — especially if they’re on the other team — but hatred of a player typically says more about a lack of discernment in those who feel so emboldened to judge freely.
(For the record, while I am unaware of any current abhorrence, let me extend my sincerest apologies for previous behavior in my youth directed toward Indiana University, the Dukies, and any and all teams associated with Tom Brady. Yes, sorry… I’m wiser now.)
Third and lastly, no less, there is one more key learning from my beloved Boilermakers failure to win the coveted NCAA crown. Yes, that’s a tad on the dramatic side…
But it’s true. We failed. We did not achieve our ultimate goal. We were not the featured stars in the annual “One Shining Moment.” With the champagne chilling in anticipation of a more favorable end result, to say me and my family were disappointed is indeed a significant understatement. I was sad that we did not win.
But…
Just because I feel one emotion strongly doesn’t negate my ability to feel another emotion, potentially even more. Wow… I wish we would have won on Monday night! But… know what I feel even more deeply today?
A deep, permeating sense of gratitude for a group of young men who played their hearts out, were respectful to those around them, and gave me more to celebrate in college basketball than ever before in my lifetime. That, my friends, is incredibly joyful. And nothing in the above or in the actual outcome changes how I feel.
There’s always so much to learn…
Far beyond the sports world.
Respectfully…
AR