The Queen on her court

Claire Stewart takes the in-bounds pass from Papa Stew.
She drives to her left, throws in an amazing spin move and shakes her defender.
She drives two steps to her right, stutter steps, then reverses direction toward the hoop.
With only seconds left on the clock, she sets her feet and squares up to the basket.
Making this shot means the state title.  A miss means a long, agonizing bike ride home.
She releases the ball as the buzzer sounds.  It's up... it's GOOD!
The crowd goes wild!!! Claire runs over to high five her Papa. 
After a short trip home, it's time to hit the bathtub then off to bed.
It was a good night at the park...

“I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game winning shot...and missed. And I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why... I succeed.”

                                                                                                                - Michael Jordan

Gone Mad!

Is there any better time of the year? Seriously. I don't want to get all religious, but March Madness gives meaning to my life. And here I bet you thought I was going to write about the virtues and reverence of green beer. Well, while I do love drinking beer until I'm green in the face, I'll take March Madness over St. Patrick's Day or any other holiday for that matter. As usual, I'm parked on the couch in front of the TV. However, unlike my college days, I'm sipping on a Starbucks Venti Iced Mocha rather than a longneck bottle of Old Milwaukee Light. Of course, I've entered a few NCAA basketball pools, which really hasn't gone well for me since the 1990's (when I actually followed teams and watched college basketball most week nights and Saturday afternoons). But this year, I tried to get Claire involved so she could enter a pool for the chance of adding some cash to her piggy bank.

So last night, I sat her at the kitchen table with a bracket printed out. I started by asking her, "Okay, Claire... who will win between Duke and Hampton?" to which she replied, "Hampton!" Then I asked, "Who will win between Michigan and Tennessee?" She answered, "Tennessee!" I asked, "What about Arizona and Memphis?" And she'd say, "Memphis!" This continued for a short while before I realized she was only repeating the name of the second school in each match-up. So I decided on a different strategy and would let Claire choose between the mascot names. Well, since Claire is a big fan of animals (or as she likes to say, "aminals"), our little prognosticator has determined that any team with a bear, dog, cat or bird mascot is going to do quite well in the NCAA Tournament - and Claire REALLY likes the Cincinnati Bearcats... too bad there's no such thing as a Bearcat Birdhound mascot.

But Claire's favorite team - and her pick to win The Big Dance - is the University of Richmond. And why? Well, according to Claire, the Richmond Spiders is by far the funniest team name (sorry University of Akron Zips). So if you don't have Richmond going far in your office pool, then you might as well throw away your brackets and look forward to next year's tournament.

 

Future All-State Basketball Player

Here's Claire at her basketball practice Wednesday evening... showing the crowd how old she is.