Fiasco: Punctuality and Politics Derail Reunion of Old Friends

fi·as·co noun \fē-ˈas-(ˌ)kō also -ˈäs-\ludicrous and complete failure; disaster...

That pretty much sums up my last weekend. You see, I was greatly looking forward to reuniting with perhaps one of my best childhood friends, who I had not seen since 1987. My friend has ties to the USC Athletic Department nad his Trojans were rolling into my humble burg of Minneapolis to face my alma mater and Minnesota sport's version of a fiasco, the Tim Brewster led Golden Gophers football team.

The lowley Gophs were fresh off perhaps the program's most ignoble defeat, a loss to South Dakota in this year's home opener. I can't say I was much surprised, hell I even predicted the loss, not so much because I am a football guru, but rather as a result of my complete and utter disdain for head coach Tim Brewster. Brewster was hired by U of M athletic director Joe Maturi in the wake of Glenn Mason's bowl game collapse approximately five years ago. Despite resurrecting a pitiful gopher football program and racking up the best record of any Gopher football coach in my lifetime (at least living memory), Maturi fired Mason for a flippant remark following the greatest collapse in college bowl history (i.e the Mason led Gophs blew a 30 plus halftime lead). However, Mason's crime was not losing, but rather downplaying the significance of the loss and reminding reporters that it was only a game, after all the main focus of any university was to provide an education to its student. In other words, they fired Mason for saying the same thing every U President said after every football season of my college career. But instead of replacing Mason with a Division 1, winning coach, Maturi like every one of his predecessors since the "Bernie Bierman Days", went cheap and hired an unknown, unproven commodity called Tim Brewster.

My gripe with Brewster started when he breezed into town and announced that we had no football tradition (forget 8 national championships) and that he was starting one here and now. Brewster's idea of tradition was stealing "Gator Nation" and the victory walk into the stadium from other programs. Although I never attended one of Brewster's "victory walks", I cannot wait to line the course of his and Maturi's elephant walk (think rugby) the hell out of the state.