Ringo had his own cheerleader (Ephemera Project)

Ringo had his own cheerleader.

When Ringo was little, he had his own cheerleader. I would take him to the women's games and sit down low while his mom was at work. Well, at one of those games I let him sit down by himself next to Butch. At age one a giant Cougar wearing a basketball uniform and sitting on the bleacher next to you is a fairly frightening thing to have happen. He screamed. I was only a few feet away trying to get a picture of this event, but a blonde Cougar cheerleader beat me to him. He stopped crying immediately and did not want her to put him down. Duh. She could not cheer for the next stretch of the game. A few days later at the grocery store she walked up to us and he practivally dove into her arms, leading to raised eyebrows on mom.

I enjoy women's hoops. As a freshman at Wazzu we would go to hoops games every Thursday and Saturday, it didn't matter if it was men or women we just went. That 86-87 season was the first full season of Pac 10 play for women's hoops. Over the years I had the opportunity to see a number of great players come through Pullman including Jennifer Azzi, Tina Thompson, and Kate Starbird. I believe a big part of why I watched ABL and WNBA games was that I got to witness first hand the growth and deveopment of the game and got to know players.

The Seattle Reign was fun. I was in Pullman so I only got to see a couple of games before they folded, but the game against Colorado was one of the best sporting events I attended in the 90s.

There are those in the media that dislike women's hoops. That is fine. But, they also seem to be actively interested in helping it fail, going out of their way to mock it at all times. Why they seem to need to use their collective bully pulpit to do so seems very, very wrong to me. Ignore it if they don't like it, but don't try and squash it for those that do. Taking my kids to games has been a joy; it is healthy for them to see women in sports being cheered, they are healthy role models, and the tickets are reasonable for my budget.

non-WNBA pro

10-10-97 Seattle Reign vs. San Jose Lasers (Spokane Arena) - Pre-season ABL

09-20-97 Seattle Reign vs. Long Beach Stingrays (Mercer Arena) - Pre-season ABL

02-01-97 Seattle Reign vs. Colorado Xplosion (Mercer Arena) - ABL Regular Season

-------- Columbus Quest vs. College All-Stars (U of I - Moscow ID) - ABL Exhibition during 96-97 season

+ I went to the public "wake" for the Seattle Reign when the league folded during the 98-99 season at the Seattle Center House

College Hoops

I attended a number of college games over the years at Wazzu in both Bohler Gym and at Beasley, and a couple of games at Hec Ed. There was a game against USC that went back and forth 3 times in the final minute. I watched fantastic teams from Stanford light it up.

Example
02-16-96 WSU @ UW (Hec Ed) - L - 60-78