The Diary of a Mad Memphis Fan

It is hard to understand a Memphis Tiger fan. Basically, the typical Tiger Fan is a hopeful , idealistic, masocist. The Tiger fan is stoic. The Tiger fan can watch their wonderful team be ignored all year, scrap and fight through the NCAA to lead by nine in the last two minutes of the final game and manage to lose. To lose without using their last timeout! Still the faithful Tiger fan loyally supports the team the following year, though all their great players have moved on. " They have great defense!" everyone says . You wonder how they can win if they don't have an offense, but it appears if you get two or three rebounds you can eventually score.

So, yesterday we were sooo happy! The Tigers were in the NCAA. The President picked them to go to the Final Four. ( Didn't pick them to win, but ...) So, what did we do? We attached our flags to the car. ( We caused a lot of speculation at St. Clare last year with those flags. Oh, your from Memphis? You must be the ones with the flags.)

So, we decorated our car. We were so lighthearted. I remember it as if it were only yesterday!

So today dawned. The day of the first games. The day where the second seed Tigers played a 15 seed. A 15 seed who was hungry, and wanted to play! They were scrappy! They wanted to win. The Tigers? I don't know what they were wanting. Apparently morning games don't agree with them. I didn't recognize this team. Thank goodness for Roburt Sallie. He did such a good job, scoring 35 points for the Tigers, more than three times his score in any previous game. This guy doesn't even start for the team usually. Hopefully he will from now on.

The Tigers' games kill me. Today, I cleaned the house, took a shower, and a walk all during the game, because THEY WERE KILLING ME! Right now I am watching the Gonzaga game, ( Whom the Tigers killed earlier this year) It is amusing to watch them. It's amazing how much fun it is to watch a game when you are not emotionally involved.

Yesterday we watched the 1973 Final Game between Memphis State and UCLA. TLOML was in that game, and he looked cute in those short basketball shorts. Anyway, we watched the Tigers, tie UCLA at halftime, and lose by 26 points. Why? We are Tiger Fans! We are masochists ! You know it is interesting that March Madness is during Lent. Hmmm!