The thing about being a coach’s wife is that it stinks to lose. No matter how magical the season was, at some point, it’s all gotta come to an end.
While everybody else is getting all March Madnessy, I’m trying to slowly climb down the ladder of exhilaration without falling straight to the bottom.
The coach in our household is doing fine. He’s gearing up to play in the CBI tournament in a few days, so his belly is still full of the fire of competition.
Me? I’m in recovery mode. Yesterday, I took a nap on the couch. All day. Today I’m wearing my “I can’t adult today” t-shirt. Tomorrow I will rejoin the real world. Perhaps.
I’ve been living in a hotel room in Cleveland with my kids for the past week, so part of this comes from pure exhaustion– both from traveling and from the up and down adrenaline of so many games so close together. I can’t even imagine what the players feel like right now.
Friday night, it all ended when we lost to Buffalo. My girlfriend texted me and said, “I know that you will find the silver lining.”
I already had. If we were going to lose to anybody, I wanted it to be Buffalo.
Earlier in the week, I was sitting next to the hotel pool watching my kids swim when I noticed three adorable blond-haired girls playing and giggling with their babysitter. Their daddy is the head coach of Buffalo. Their momma has lymphoma and couldn’t make the trip. She was in the hospital due to a bad reaction to her last cancer treatment.
Buffalo went on to beat everyone in the whole MAC tournament and win a spot in the Big Dance. Those three little girls were in the stands screaming their tiny heads off. But even better? Crystal Oates, the head coach’s wife, was able to make it to Saturday night’s championship game, just in time to help her husband cut down the nets.
So, yeah, I’m tired and crabby and sad that our ride has ended, but I do see the silver lining. Lots of them, actually.
