Victory

VICTORY

What a great word. But what a better feeling. As you probably know by now, the Mighty Demons of NSU--alma mater of yours truly, Corey, and the transcendent Sandy--beat Iowa on Thursday afternoon thanks to a desperation three-point heave by Jermaine Wallace with half a second to play. Within seconds of the final buzzer, my email, text messaging, and cell phone were all filled up with messages. I haven't seen them all, but I probably have to agree with the people who say this is the biggest win in school history.

I'm happy. Right now, I'm happy. I don't need us to pull off another big upset against West Virginia tomorrow afternoon to feel good or vindicated or anything like that. I was happy to watch us on national TV a week ago when we beat Sam Houston State just to make the NCAAs. Beating Iowa was gravy. Really, really, really, really nice gravy. I'm happy that people are learning that NSU is in Natchitoches, and that in some cases they're actually pronouncing it correctly. 'm happy they had our logo on the screen (last week ESPN had the logo for the Northwestern Wildcats, the school in Illinois). I'm happy that Mike McConathy and Clifton Lee were on CBS this morning. Clifton Lee, as you can tell from his photo, is a very distinctive-looking young man. The high afro goes well with his gold-grilled teeth. There's a serious temptation to make assumptions about him from his appearance. I thought he came off as pretty bright. He hasn't taken elocution lessons from Dr. Poole or anything, but you could tell he's no dummy by listening to what he was saying, rather than how he was saying it.

Lee was a big part of the Demons' comeback win. We were down 17 in the second half. He hit four threes, we kept forcing turnovers and missed shots, and when the last minute of the game arrived, we were only down one. A missed FT by a Hawkeye, a missed shot from us, a rebound, and the three. Fork 'Em Demons.

NOTE: As I write this, the alma maters of everyone this blog is for are still alive in the tournament. We rock.