Light/Breezes

Light/Breezes
SUNRISE AT DEATH VALLEY-Photo by Tom Cochrun
Showing posts with label Mike Krzyewski. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mike Krzyewski. Show all posts

Monday, April 1, 2013

COULDN'T BELIEVE OUR EYES, TRANSCENDENCE, PRECIOUS WATER AND WHAT ARE THEY?

A TRANSCENDENT MOMENT
     Something extraordinary happened in an awful moment on Easter Sunday.
     Louisville player Kevin Ware who had jumped to block a shot, came down horribly wrong, splintering his leg in a compound fracture that is as bad as any sports injury most of us have ever seen.
     Players collapsed on the floor, nearby fans were sickened and the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis was silenced, stunned and of a single mind, worried about the young athlete writhing in pain.
     His coach, Rick Pitino, is quoted as saying he fought nausea, others have said so as well.
     Clark Kellogg, who is great guy and a caring compassionate man was barely able to compose himself as he performed his CBS Sports broadcast role.  His partner Jim Nantz, another class act, also battled back tears, as did the fiercely competitive Coach K, Mike Krzyzewski.  
      For almost ten minutes cultural icons like Pitino, Krzyzewski, Kellogg and Nantz, wiped tears and worked on. The broadcasters evinced great concern for Ware and for his team mates who were in shock.  Even as Pitino and Coach K looked shaken, ashen and blinked tears, they were concerned for their charges and their well being.  We look at Division 1 athletes as men, as competitive stallions, but they are young men, some just out of high school.
      You could see people pray, the broadcasters said they were praying, later even the colorful Charles Barkley said he too was praying for Ware.
      In a moment, a highly charged and superb athletic ritual is dashed.  A young man lay seriously injured, on a playing floor, not a battle field.  The uniform he wore was that of a basketball player, not a soldier, cop or firefighter.  A terrible and ugly reality crashed into a cultural celebration.
Fans, players, coaches, commentators, in this framed world of hyper play, responded to their shock and dismay with an almost automatic response of care, concern and prayer.
      Young Kevin Ware, his bone protruding from his skin, who dreams of playing professional ball, in excruciating pain, uncertain of his future, continued to tell his panic stricken team mates, "Don't worry about me.  Just win the game.  Win the game."
      The thousands in the stadium and the millions of us watching television, have never seen anything like that before.  In the midst of a game, a horrible event prompts an almost universal concern and thousands or millions of prayers.  Something extraordinary, in an awful moment, on an Easter Sunday.
      

CLAY PLAY
wherein a new ceramic project from Lana provides an
interesting photo opportunity.






SAN SIMEON CREEK
    Our rainy season has been almost 50% deficient this year.
We are experiencing a couple of days of light rain and hoping the system slows to deliver more.  
    The photos were shot last week on San Simeon Creek, one of the two primary water sources for municipal wells. In a good year, the creek runs with a swifter current and the gravel bars are not visible, until late in the summer.  
     Talk of lifting a building moratorium to permit a "few" new construction permits a year seems ill advised in a drought year and at a time when some climatologists say we are in a drought cycle.  I understand the frustration of property owners who have been waiting years to build, but still, water is a precious resource and this year it is even more precious.




    See you down the trail.

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

EXTRAORDINARY MATTERS

THE WINNINGEST
Photo by Patrick McDermott/Getty Images
THE SUPER K's
It was an historic moment when Duke Coach Mike  Krzyewski and his mentor, former Coach Bob Knight
embraced after Coach K surpassed Knight as the 
college basketball coach with the most wins.
And it was special. Touching even.  Coach K
played for Knight at Army and was an assistant to Knight.
I consider it good fortune to have spent time with both
men.  I covered Bob Knight for a couple of decades.
The men admire each other.  Both are brilliant students of the game and they have an unequaled success. And as Knight mentored Coach K, Coach K has mentored many others.  Before moving from Indiana, one of our "farewell tour" events was watching Duke play IU at Assembly Hall.
My WISH TV sports anchor Anthony Calhoun arranged for tickets immediately behind the Duke bench.  What a show!
When Coach K, stood, his assistant coaches stood.  When
he unbuttoned his blue blazer, his assistant coaches unbuttoned their blue blazers, and so it went.
My all time favorite coach was the great Johnny Wooden
who combined class and decorum with brilliance.
Coach K is cut from that cloth. The kids who emulate him
are getting a good pattern of excellence.
Last night as I watched Mike and Bob embrace
I thought that if Bob had better controlled his
emotions and had found, at times, a better and more appropriate channel for his 
extraordinary perception of the game, Mike
might still be trying to better Knight's record.
ONE MORE TIME
GET THE BIG MONEY OUT OF POLITICS
Tea party or OWS activist, conservative or
liberal, regardless of your stance, all should
agree that getting big money out of politics
will make for better government.
In fact experience leads me to believe until
corporate and big dollar influence is limited
we'll continue to see a deterioration of the quality
of government and a sell out to denizens of greed.
NPR presented a brilliant demonstration of the problem
with a focus on how the Nixon administration sold out
to the milk producers.  What was illegal then is noW
appropriate.  This might raise your blood pressure.
DAY BOOK
COASTAL SCENES
 The Big Blue (and turquoise)
 Dunes Hiking
 Well off the beaten path
See you down the trail.