Prioritizing Passions

Porter: Prioritizing Sports

It’s 8:20 p.m. on a Tuesday night. My mind is running at a hundred miles per second. I couldn’t bare to wait any longer for the KU game to begin. My brothers, mom, and stepdad begin to fill the living room, all anticipating a tremendous game with Duke, the No. 1 team in the nation, playing our No. 7 Jayhawks. This game is either going to end in exciting cheers or a room full of cursing parents.

Throughout the game, KU and Duke continuously flip back and forth for the lead. I practically dig fingernail impressions into my mom’s hand while the last minute of the stop clock is ticking down. After a timeout, KU is up 75-72 with 8.2 seconds left in the game. My heart is pounding, my hands start to sweat. Frank Mason works the final possession of the game, he suddenly stops, shoots and the potential game winner goes through the hoop. After Duke defender Matt Jones misfired an attempted half-court shot, KU secured its second victory in the Classic against Duke.

My whole life, I have been surrounded with KU games and a variety of collegiate and professional sports. I have put off hours of math homework to watch these game and essentially put them before everything else. My parents and siblings have taught me all I know about basketball, football, baseball and hockey. In my house, if any sports game is on, my family is watching it; if not, the TV rumbles with ESPN’s Top Ten.

Born with crimson and blue in my blood, the Jayhawks have became a huge part of my childhood. I have learned to love KU, but it is not only the Jayhawks that I adore. I love watching the Chiefs come back to beat the Broncos in overtime, the Cubs win the world series, and the Blackhawks crushing teams on the ice. Every season brings on a new team for me to root for. Some of my earliest memories are having friends and family fill my house to watch numerous football, basketball games and baseball games.

This year, I’m excited for even more late nights and nail-biting games spent with my family to come. My math homework will just have to wait until the buzzer rings or the referee blows the final whistle.

Courtney: Prioritizing anything else

It’s 8:20 p.m. on a Tuesday night and the KU-Duke basketball game is tipping off. My whole family’s watching while I sit in the background playing on my phone and periodically working on my statistics homework. At the start of the second half I’ve migrated from my family room couch to the comfort of my bed, curled up watching Gilmore Girls on Netflix. By 10 p.m., any hope of me seeing the end of the game has disappeared. Instead, all I care about is getting my full eight hours of sleep. Staying up any later isn’t worth it to see the end of a game I don’t care about.

I woke up the next morning inundated with news of the apparent nail biter of a game I had slept through. I admittedly felt a little out of the loop as my friends buzzed over the excitement of the previous night’s game. But I’m used to being the friend standing silently in the background nodding my head in agreement to everyone’s talk of game-winning three pointers and bogus referee calls.

Every year, as the college basketball season descends upon us, these discussions remind me of my complete lack of interest when it comes to sports. But I’m not a complete idiot when it comes to sports. My parents have made sure I know that there are four downs in football and my Dad was even my elementary school basketball coach.

But I could not for the life of me name one player on this season’s KU basketball team. Ask me who Donald Trump hopes to name as a Supreme Court Justice or Secretary of State, and I can answer easily. I’d rather watch the Today Show than ESPN’s Top Ten. I’m part of the Kansas City Youth Symphony, but have never been apart of a Fantasy Football League. I just have other interests besides collegiate and professional sports.

I find myself scrolling through Kendall Jenner’s Instagram instead of Frank Mason’s. I’d rather read about Trump’s latest scandals instead of the drama from last night’s basketball game.          

And so once again this year, I’ll continue to nod my head in agreement as my friends talk about that exciting KU basketball game that I slept through. But I’m not concerned at my failure to maintain any interest in sports, because my priorities and interests are in other things.