May 10, 2007
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What a busy and exciting time to be a Commodore! Every day seems to bring more sunshine to our already bright landscape.
Let’s Start on the Diamond
There is a lot of buzz about Commodore baseball and for good reason. The Commodores have virtually locked up the SEC East pennant race, leading second place South Carolina by four games with just six remaining. The focus is now on winning the SEC outright; we’ve got a one-game lead over SEC West leader Arkansas, which travels to Alabama this weekend and concludes by hosting Ole Miss. The `Dores travel to Auburn this weekend and finish at home with LSU.
I just checked with the ticket office and as of Wednesday (May 9) afternoon, we have sold a lot of tickets to the NCAA Regional Tournament and are sitting on a wait list of over 500 names. When we add the mandatory visitor’s tickets (600 total), we have about 75% of Hawkins Field sold already – before that wait list has had a chance to buy.
So, one more time for those of you with baseball season tickets that have not yet purchased your regional tickets, please act before May 18. At that point, you will lose priority status and you could be flirting with not getting into Hawkins Field for these big games.
If you are dragging your feet until the sites are officially formalized, I urge you in this case to act because we are as sure a thing to host as one can be. There is no risk, other than risking you lose your place to someone behind you in line.
We realize that this is a new concept – buying for a post-season baseball tournament that hasn’t been announced. But, hey, being the No. 1 rated team in the nation for three straight months is also a new thing. It’s fun!
If you have questions, call the ticket office between 8:30 and 5 p.m. Central time at 615-322-GOLD.
Near Perfect 10
Ten Commodore teams have or will have made their respective NCAA Tournaments during this 2006-07 school year. That is one better than our previous high-water mark set in 2004, when we were in the top 10% in the Director’s Cup standings.
Football Season Tickets Booming
Commodore fans are bullish about their football team. At least that is one explanation for why our season ticket sales are running between 1,500 and 2,000 more than we had last year at the same point in time.
Still Winning in the Classroom
The numbers are still preliminary but it appears that our student-athletes narrowly missed a major goal of our Stratton Foster academic support team.
These 322 Commodores combined this year to earn a 2.986 grade point, just missing that coveted 3.0 that is the target. When one considers just how demanding it is in those Top 20 classrooms and how much is expected by our coaches on the playing fields, this is truly remarkable.
Please Hold for the President…
Our bowling team has enjoyed hundreds of congratulatory calls, letters and emails since winning the national championship last month but nothing prepared Coach John Williamson for the one he received Monday afternoon.
Busy at his desk, the phone rings and the caller identifies himself as part of the White House staff. You immediately think, “Ya, and I’m the Queen of England” but then you realize it is no joke. Your team is being invited to meet the President in the White House. You are given a date – June 18.
What was so surprising is that no college bowling team had ever received such an invitation and there hasn’t been a bowling team of any kind since President Nixon honored an international team in 1971.
Williamson spent the rest of his afternoon tracking down his team, almost all of whom had left after final exams. Needless to say, everyone’s plans are changing.
What struck me, pardon the pun, has been how much this invitation means to the bowling world. It’s bigger than Vanderbilt; bowling’s infrastructure sees this invitation as a much-awaited step toward recognition and legitimacy. One of the nation’s two largest bowling magazines called to say it is considering putting the White House photograph on the cover of its publication.
