for 4/18 

Sport -Thoughts    by Mike Moffett

BOOKS, WOMEN’S BASKETBALL, AND MEN COACHING GIRLS

Let’s get the shameless self-promotion out of the way first.

Did I mention I wrote a book?

Alert Weirs Times readers may recall that I recently co-authored “FAHIM  SPEAKS: A Warrior-Actor’s Odyssey from Afghanistan to Hollywood and Back.”  Brendan Smith wrote a wonderful Weirs Times story about the project last year.

(So what does that have to do with a sports column?  Please keep reading.)

A couple weeks ago I got a call from a friend in southern California, who explained that she knew a radio personality at KTLK-AM Talk Radio in Los Angeles who’d had a cancellation for her show, leaving an opening in the second hour. Was I interested in calling in to the show to talk about the book?

“Of course!”

But it meant calling L.A. at 1:30 p.m. EDT on a Wednesday, when I’m in the middle of a three hour “Sports and Society” class.  I’d have to bow out.

“My class meets at that time. Sorry. Maybe if it was about sports I could have taken a bit of class time.  Too bad.”

 

Then I was told that the host, Teal Marchande, had a daughter who played basketball for Cal-Berkeley, which was headed for the NCAA Women’s Final Four in New Orleans.

 

“OK.” I replied. “If there’s a sports component I can try to call during class, if we can make it interactive with my students.”

So I explained to my students that we were going to be on a major L.A. talk radio station, and that the scheduled quiz would be delayed a bit.  While we waited for our assigned call time, Jessica--an NHTI Lynx women’s college basketball standout--got her computer out and looked up Teal’s daughter’s information.

“Talia Caldwell is 6-foot-3,” said Jess. “She has over 1000 career rebounds and shoots 62 percent from the floor. And her father, Ravin Caldwell, was a linebacker with the NFL's Washington Redskins from 1987 to 1992, winning Super Bowl rings in 1987 and 1991.”

Sports component?  I THINK!

When we finally went live I explained I was sitting in the middle of class with my cell phone on speaker, and we first wanted to know how it felt to be the mom of a hoopster bound for the FINAL FOUR! Teal seemed delighted by the question and spoke at length of her excitement and anticipation.  As the parent of a couple of daughters who enjoyed some sports successes, I could relate. I thought of Concord’s Dave and Paula Bonnor, whose daughter Becky enjoyed some high level women’s basketball success at Stanford University (Cal’s big rival) over ten years ago. Becky’s brother Luke played big-time basketball at West Virginia and UMass. And older brother Matt is still making his parents proud, playing for the San Antonio Spurs and almost winning the NBA three-point shooting contest during All-Star weekend.

Teal and I did eventually talk about the “FAHIM SPEAKS” book and movie projects, of course, but we came back to sports.

 

“I’m in a room filled with Celtic fans who want to know what’s wrong with the Lakers,” I explained.  Teal laughed and put in a plug for the Clippers before her producer and engineer weighed in on the Lakers.

 

“Horrible coach.”

I thanked Teal for the air time, and explained that the pending quiz could be delayed, but not avoided, and our class went back to business.

 

But we now had a personal interest in the women’s Final Four. I went to ESPN the next Sunday and saw the Louisville Cardinals overcome a big Cal lead to knock off the Bears and advance to the Finals against UConn, where the Huskies easily triumphed.  I loved watching Cal coach Lindsay Gottlieb, and noted that she was once a basketball assistant at the University of New Hampshire, under Sue Johnson.  Small world!

I was disappointed that Gottlieb didn’t get a chance to face UConn and its coaching legend Luigi "Geno" Auriemma. In our “Sports and Society” class, we sometimes discuss the concerns of folks who feel that women should be coached by women, folks who especially chafe at Auriemma’s success, and who look for a great female hope to put him in his place. Maybe Lindsay will someday get the chance that she just missed out on in 2013.  But that’s a different story for another day.

Go Bears!

Bear Fact …

 

Cal-Berkeley and Stanford played one of the first-ever women's college basketball games in 1896. Stanford won, 2-1. Men were excluded, as women guarded the gymnasium windows and doors to keep out curious male students.

 

And …

Did I mention that I wrote a book?

 

Lindsay ...

Geno ...