I'm weary of starting a new thread but, in this case, I'm going to pull rank.
I also am not sure that I'm going to have a written, coherent column about this tonight - probably in the morning sometime - but I think it's worth sharing some of my thoughts on the past 48 hours with you guys so you know some of the feedback I've gotten and the conversations that I've had.
I don't want to prioritize anything over anything else because the reality here is that no one aspect of this is more important than any other. It just is what it is.
So the first thing, based on relevancy to the most immediate thing in my purview, is what this does to hoops.
Best season, biggest accomplishments, and one of the best players of all-time in the program just has the most abrupt end imaginable. They're taking it hard. Really hard. I just don't think any of us can really properly understand what it's like to pour your soul into something - either as player or coach the way that Lamar Stevens and the staff have with each other - and to see all of that effort go away in a matter of hours. There's no prep for it. It's just getting off the plane and, essentially, goodbye. I can't imagine how hard that was for those guys.
In time, those feelings will pass and evolve into an appreciation for everything that was *already* accomplished by this group of players and coaches. There is no denying what they were able to do in inarguably the most challenging conference slate that I've ever seen in my time covering the team.
These guys know this more than anyone though that, at heart, coaches are educators, and this situation is overwhelmingly ripe with life lessons that are and will continue to be applicable for a long, long time.
Bottom line, you absolutely *should* pour your heart into whatever it is that you love in your life. You absolutely *should* pursue those loves like it could be your last chance to do so. Because however it ends, however prepared or not you are for the moment, it *will* end. Be passionate, don't downplay that passion or hold it back in any way, and pursue your passions without restraint.
Per the cancellation of the Big Ten tournament and the NCAA tournament, some of the real-world feedback I've gotten that I posted in another thread, I'll just cut and paste here because I think it says it all:
"There are people who are experts at this and they're all saying the same thing.
"That's the bottom line from all of this. We're looking at, effectively, a national shutdown for the next few weeks, minimum. The people making the decisions understand it and have to make decisions in that context.
"Nobody - zero - of these people, save for maybe the Ivies, wanted this to be the decision they had to make. It's not about liability, it's not about lawsuits, it's not about anything other than the wellbeing of, well, everyone."
Effectively, the highest levels of the NCAA and Big Ten and every other conference were getting the same message from the experts. They understood when making their decisions that the continuation of events would only exacerbate issues that are already in progress and worthy of real concern. And so, not without serious consideration, the ultimate decisions became readily apparent for the decision-makers when contextualized with the reality of what is taking place here and globally. But it was with that great consideration that the decisions were ultimately made.
This is no joke, and the people at the top know it. No joke does not mean national panic - certainly a balance needs to be struck - but it does mean prioritizing and giving serious consideration to it.
On to football:
One of the things that immediately jumped out to me last night was the reality that you can't have a separate standard between the larger student population and that of your student-athletes. So if the larger student population isn't on campus - or even some other segments of the student populations - you can't have football.
So once they went to online only classes that was, in effect, it for football spring practices.
There are all kinds of elements to this that I don't know about that I'm going to have to seek out and explore in the coming days and weeks. But obviously this is a fluid situation and so there is the likelihood that things will continue to evolve.
We'll continue to work to get answers for the wide swath of questions that are going to come up from all of this. There are things that haven't even been thought of that will have to be worked out. But, like I said, we'll work to get as much perspective as we can on all of it.
I also am not sure that I'm going to have a written, coherent column about this tonight - probably in the morning sometime - but I think it's worth sharing some of my thoughts on the past 48 hours with you guys so you know some of the feedback I've gotten and the conversations that I've had.
I don't want to prioritize anything over anything else because the reality here is that no one aspect of this is more important than any other. It just is what it is.
So the first thing, based on relevancy to the most immediate thing in my purview, is what this does to hoops.
Best season, biggest accomplishments, and one of the best players of all-time in the program just has the most abrupt end imaginable. They're taking it hard. Really hard. I just don't think any of us can really properly understand what it's like to pour your soul into something - either as player or coach the way that Lamar Stevens and the staff have with each other - and to see all of that effort go away in a matter of hours. There's no prep for it. It's just getting off the plane and, essentially, goodbye. I can't imagine how hard that was for those guys.
In time, those feelings will pass and evolve into an appreciation for everything that was *already* accomplished by this group of players and coaches. There is no denying what they were able to do in inarguably the most challenging conference slate that I've ever seen in my time covering the team.
These guys know this more than anyone though that, at heart, coaches are educators, and this situation is overwhelmingly ripe with life lessons that are and will continue to be applicable for a long, long time.
Bottom line, you absolutely *should* pour your heart into whatever it is that you love in your life. You absolutely *should* pursue those loves like it could be your last chance to do so. Because however it ends, however prepared or not you are for the moment, it *will* end. Be passionate, don't downplay that passion or hold it back in any way, and pursue your passions without restraint.
Per the cancellation of the Big Ten tournament and the NCAA tournament, some of the real-world feedback I've gotten that I posted in another thread, I'll just cut and paste here because I think it says it all:
"There are people who are experts at this and they're all saying the same thing.
"That's the bottom line from all of this. We're looking at, effectively, a national shutdown for the next few weeks, minimum. The people making the decisions understand it and have to make decisions in that context.
"Nobody - zero - of these people, save for maybe the Ivies, wanted this to be the decision they had to make. It's not about liability, it's not about lawsuits, it's not about anything other than the wellbeing of, well, everyone."
Effectively, the highest levels of the NCAA and Big Ten and every other conference were getting the same message from the experts. They understood when making their decisions that the continuation of events would only exacerbate issues that are already in progress and worthy of real concern. And so, not without serious consideration, the ultimate decisions became readily apparent for the decision-makers when contextualized with the reality of what is taking place here and globally. But it was with that great consideration that the decisions were ultimately made.
This is no joke, and the people at the top know it. No joke does not mean national panic - certainly a balance needs to be struck - but it does mean prioritizing and giving serious consideration to it.
On to football:
One of the things that immediately jumped out to me last night was the reality that you can't have a separate standard between the larger student population and that of your student-athletes. So if the larger student population isn't on campus - or even some other segments of the student populations - you can't have football.
So once they went to online only classes that was, in effect, it for football spring practices.
There are all kinds of elements to this that I don't know about that I'm going to have to seek out and explore in the coming days and weeks. But obviously this is a fluid situation and so there is the likelihood that things will continue to evolve.
We'll continue to work to get answers for the wide swath of questions that are going to come up from all of this. There are things that haven't even been thought of that will have to be worked out. But, like I said, we'll work to get as much perspective as we can on all of it.
