This is probably a good time to give an update on the ladies' season for you people who don't really follow them (and if you don't follow them religiously I pity you). With an 11-2 record and the two losses being to number one and five Connecticut and Notre Dame, respectively, the team begins Big 10 play tonight against Illinois. I'm going to go on record and say they'll finish undefeated in the conference during the season. You're probably thinking, "That's a bold statement Courtney, I highly doubt that will happen." You're right, it is bold, but I figure that if the girls can guard our group of practice guys, they can guard whatever Penn State and Nebraska throw at them. If they don't finish undefeated, I'll admit I was wrong and go on with my life. But, if they finish undefeated, anyone who reads this post will donate $10 to my college fund. I will, in fact, track every one of you down. I have a very particular set of skills that I've acquired after watching both Taken movies, skills that make me a nightmare for people like you.
At this point, I really wish I had a new, funny story about practice to tell. But, the fact is practice has been somewhat uneventful over break. I really haven't done much except drink Gatorade and talk to the managers. With that said, I've decided to share my experiences at the team banquets so far. As a sophomore, I've only been to three, but let me tell you those three have provided more than enough entertainment. If you played a high school sport, you're banquets were probably really, really lame. Like, lame as in people brought KFC and Pizza Hut for dinner because they were too lazy to cook, and these people were probably the parents of your lazy ass teammates. Somebody always brought some kind of casserole dish that looked so awful everybody made a face and scooted away from it as they walked down the line. I always believed dessert was the way to go because, for one, everybody likes dessert, and two, even if you bring a bad dessert, its still better than 75% of the main dishes brought. Then, after you ate the three things that looked like it wouldn't give you chronic diarrhea, your coach got up and talked...and talked...and talked about the season. My high school basketball banquet always happened to fall on the Sunday of the final round of the Masters. So, naturally, I would put my phone in my lap and watch Tiger and Phil go at it and fist pump along with them. I got the "put your damn phone away" look from my mother but I didn't care. I was just passing the time until I got my letter then I could get out of there.
Purdue being the classy university that it is, takes athletic banquets to a new level. The first one I attended was the preseason banquet last season and was held in the Ross Ade Stadium press box. I had only been practicing with the team for a couple weeks at the time, so I wasn't sure how things worked and what people wore to these banquets. I decided to play it safe and go with a dress shirt and tie Good decision right? Well, other than one of the assistant coaches, I was the only person under 60 years old wearing a tie. The other practice guys were wearing a polo and dress pants. In fact, I believe Jed Hasselbring (fellow practice bitch, you'll be hearing his name from time to time, so learn it) was wearing white Jordan's. I felt about as out of place as Kobe Bryant in a room full of the NBA's greatest passers.
They sat the practice squad and the managers at the back two tables in the room, which was fine by me because we were the closest to the buffet line and made it easier when I went back for seconds and thirds and maybe fourths. I figured I would be sitting with the rest of the practice guys, but that would only make sense right? I got the s-h-i-t end of the stick and got stuck with one other practice guy (which was fine) and six fans who apparently wanted to play an extended version of 20 questions with us called 10,000 questions. Like I said, I hadn't been practicing with the team for long, so I knew next to nothing about the team and barely knew who was who. They kept asking Corbin (the other practice guy) and I these questions about the players and how good we thought the team was going to be. Luckily I've had a lot of practice when it comes to making things up, I get a lot of chances in the classroom and it finally paid off. I fed them I distinctly remember how these ladies were obsessed with point guard KK Houser, but the problem was they kept calling her Kiki. I didn't have the guts to correct them and sort of wanted this to continue because it was very entertaining but eventually it became annoying. I kept looking at the table next to us with everyone else and they were just having the time of their life watching me lose my mind. It was like being stuck at the kids table at a family gathering and looking over at the adult table thinking how cool it would be to sit with the cool people.
The last two banquets have been at the Four Points by Sheraton in West Lafayette, which ironically is where my high school also held a banquet for the top 50 students in my graduating class (I happened to be at table one). College banquets differ from high school banquets in multiple ways. The most obvious being the food. I give props to the Sheraton, they don't serve KFC and Pizza Hut. Its usually some kind of meat with red potatoes and green beans. They give us the dessert on our table at the beginning which I believe is code for dessert first. Someone at my table always ends up without a chocolate cake and never knows why. The best part of these banquets is by far the rolls, and anyone who has ever been at one of these banquets will back me up. In fact, they're so good I slipped a $5 bill into the waiter's pocket (big spender) to keep a steady dose of them coming our way.
The team banquet usually consists of Coach Versyp saying some words, as well as athletic director Morgan Burke and radio announcer Tim Newton. Then comes story time from the players, a time when they share team events with a group of people who paid to sit, eat, and listen to their idols speak. If you're expecting me to remember a particular story told by one of the players, you should realize that's not my job. I will say this, I sat next to the kid who wears the Purdue Pete costume at the last banquet and it ruined my childhood, kind of like finding out Santa...well never mind. Purdue Pete always seemed real even though his head isn't at all proportionate to his body.
As we enter the new year and you all break your resolutions this month, I have big plans for the blog. The biggest being that The Exponent, Purdue's student newspaper, will be including parts of my blog posts on a weekly basis beginning next week. From there, I plan on getting interviews with ESPN and 60 Minutes. I don't think getting Erin Andrews to interview me is asking too much. College football season is practically over and she's bound to be bored. Maybe I'll be offered a job to write nonsense for a magazine, which would really make getting my education at Purdue somewhat pointless. At this point you've figured out this post has absolutely nothing to do with New Year resolutions. But, I got you to read this far because you thought I would have a witty and interesting resolution. Sorry to disappoint, but I don't.
Happy New Year and Roll Tide
No comments:
Post a Comment