March Madness

Someone who owned the house before us put in the kind of laundry washtub faucet that Home Depot and Ace don’t carry, if they ever did.  Replacing exotic plumbing fixtures means going to exotic plumbing-fixtures’ stores.  The guys behind the counter at the store I went to in Villa Park yesterday all looked like retired Chicago precinct captains who’d given up cigars for Lent.  I think they sold me the right faucet.  We’ll see.

Lucky for me Villa Park is next door to Elmhurst, which provided the perfect excuse to drop in on Coach P of the Elmhurst softball Bluejays.  To visit Coach P is to be treated as an honored guest.  I came away with a sweatshirt and jersey but passed on a cap; considering I was already wearing a Bluejays cap, another on top of that would just look silly.  This being a week before starting the season in Florida, Coach took me to the gym to look at his players, who were at a morning practice.

The last girls to play with Clare graduated last spring; my daughter the player now exists solely in school record books and photos in Coach’s office.  Time marches on, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.  That said, I did like what I saw of these Bluejays, taller than in the past and maybe ready to play in the CCIW postseason tournament for the first time since Clare’s sophomore year.  Coach deserves it.

Along with loading me down with stuff, Coach felt the need to introduce me to anyone within twenty feet of us: players; an assistant coach; the school athletic director; the school athletic director’s assistant; a few robins in the parking lot when he walked me out to my car.  “This is Clare Bukowski’s dad, and Clare was…” one heck of a player.

As I was leaving, we bumped into yet another player.  After the obligatory introduction, this junior Bluejay said she was off to a nursing midterm, and a little nervous.  Coach being Coach, he told her to calm down, she’d do fine.  Last week, the Big Ten played its basketball tournament at Madison Square Garden.  I wonder how many classes the players missed and how many players have visited the inside of a classroom since getting back.  I mean, who can concentrate on school when the NCAA brackets won’t be announced until Sunday?

No doubt, D-I coaches tell their players to calm down, too.  Go to class, take an exam?  That’s strictly D-III.