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GOVER’S TRAVEL BLOG: My Final Four adventure

By Cliff McArdle Apr 11, 2019 | 3:09 PM

Back in January, I was asked by AP-Radio to help cover the Final Four up in Minneapolis, Minnesota. I was honored to be asked because, as a kid, I’d always dreamed about covering sports my whole life. Through my affiliation with 102.5 The Game these past five years and AP-Radio these past four (and section303.com for several years before that), I’ve gotten a chance to live that dream.

I’ve covered Nashville Predators games, Tennessee Titans games, the Major League Baseball Winter Meetings, the SEC tournament, the NCAA Tournament when the first two rounds were here last year and many other events. But never had I been selected as an invite to an event as large as the Final Four. And to be invited for results-based reasons? I discussed things with my amazing and supportive wife and we decided that I should do it. I bought my train ticket a few days later and was all set to go over two months in advance.

“A train? Why not fly?” you ask. Well, I’m terrified to fly. I mean, I do it for my day job (a/k/a “job #1”) at the Barbershop Harmony Society but I hate it. If you’ve known me for any length of time, you’re not surprised by this. I make no secret about it. What I don’t like to talk about is why I’m terrified to fly. But, against my better judgment, I’ll try to explain that here since it’ll help answer the train question.

Look, I know the odds. I know thousands of planes take off and land every day and are just fine. I know all of that. So I’m usually fine leading up to any flight. I can get to an airport on time, get through security without issue and even sit and wait for my plane without thinking much about it. But, from the moment the cabin door closes until we’re below the cloud line while descending, my brain is twisted around itself. I don’t make a scene so, unless you’re literally sitting next to me, I’m positive you don’t notice anything is out of the ordinary. But, mentally, I’m unraveling.

Through no fault of my own, I go into what’s called “catastrophic thinking.” My mind begins to wonder what it would be like to drop out of the sky. Would I be conscious long enough to understand that this is the end? If I am, would I be calm enough to pray that He takes care of my six-year old son who has no idea that I’m not coming home? Or would my brain shut off before I realize anything’s amiss? And what would that fear even feel like? Is it true fear or is it more hopelessness? And at what point in the flight, if we went down, are people still be able to survive? Would I be one of those people? Would I even want to be one of those people? Could I live with the images and emotions that comes along with being a survivor while this nice family from Sioux Falls who sat in front of me didn’t make it? And why didn’t they make it? What did I do differently than them? How will their families grieve? Should I go to their funerals if I’m physically able to do so?

And that’s all in the first few minutes. There’s typically still hours left in the flight at that point which means I’ll think these thoughts again and again until we return to the ground.

In short, my blood pressure skyrockets to unhealthy levels, it takes all of my willpower to get up if the person next to me needs to use the restroom and, if there’s the slightest amount of turbulence (which there always is), I grip the armrest to the point where my fingers and hands hurt by the time I let go.

So I prefer traveling by rail.

As I explained here, there’s no Amtrak station in the Nashville area so I have to get creative which, given my anxiety for flying, is not a problem. I discovered that, if I wanted to go this route, I would have to drive two and a half hours to Newbern, Tennessee, jump on the midnight train to Chicago and then transfer in the Windy City. So that’s what I did.

It was the morning of Thursday, April 4 and words cannot describe how excited I was to get on that train. But, before I could even think about doing that, first I had to work a full day at the Society then walk across the street and attend the first period of the Nashville Predators/Vancouver Canucks game. Despite having been up since 5:30am, when that first period horn sounded, I was pumped to make that drive. Adrenaline kept me going because getting to Newbern meant it was all real. It meant I was really going to cover a Final Four.

The train arrived at 12:25am on Friday morning, I got my ticket scanned, checked into my sleeper car and settled in to finally get some rest.

When I eventually arrived in Minneapolis and was waiting for my Lyft, there were plenty of exchanges of “War Eagle!” overheard and it hit me how big this weekend was. Not just for me and my career but also for all of these fans who had come by plane, train and automobile in order to root on their respective teams. It’s Auburn’s first ever Final Four appearance, Virginia and Texas Tech have never played for a national championship, let alone won one, and Michigan State hasn’t won it all since the turn of the millennium.

I got about six hours sleep at my co-workers house (who graciously let me crash there for the weekend) and headed to US Bank Stadium, home of the Minnesota Vikings. Upon arrival, a security checkpoint that had “CREDENTIAL PICK UP” on the sign behind them went through my backpack and let me pass through. This is notable because, a few minutes later while aimlessly wandering around that side of the stadium looking for the media credential station, a police officer walked up to me. I explained that I was looking for the place to pick up my media credentials and he did not like that. I don’t recall what he said but the start of it was “How the hell did you penetrate the perimeter, sir?”

Long story short, he told me that I was looking for a place on the opposite side of the stadium and I could walk around until I found it. Feeling lucky not to have been arrested for “penetrating the perimeter,” I cased the stadium looking for the corner of 4th and Chicago. About 15 minutes (and what seemed like 16,000 steps) later, I found the media trailer but I couldn’t get to it. It was right across the street from where I was but seemed miles away. The security was so tight that there was no break in the fencing except for where I’d come in. Yet another member of security saw me looking lost and I explained my story once again. He was much nicer, walked me past the security threshold and over to the trailer.

Once legally inside the stadium, I set up shop in the media workroom and quickly went to my seat in the south end zone near the court, directly behind the Virginia student section. Auburn led at the half but went down by as much as 10 in the second before mounting a furious comeback that saw them up by two in the closing seconds. The Cavaliers got away with a double-dribble that wasn’t called and then Auburn guard Samir Doughty fouled Kyle Guy on his desperation final second three-point shot. Guy would go to the line and bury all three to win the game, 63-62, and put Virginia into their first National Championship Game.

Auburn junior Jared Harper met with the media moments later and, despite all the temptation to do otherwise, took the high road.

When I get out of the Auburn locker room, the second game between Michigan State and Texas Tech has already started. By the time I clip my sound bites, write my scripts for said sound bites and send audio to the AP, it’s 23-21 Texas Tech at halftime. Also around this time, however, the Predators had mounted a comeback over the Chicago Blackhawks in the season finale. I was watching it on the Fox Sports Go app in my press area seat so, regardless of the outcome, I could hit publish on whichever blog was relevant.

See, with my downtime on the train, I had prepped three different stories regarding the Predators and their playoff position, one for each possible scenario. If they beat Chicago, they won the Central so I had to write a post for that. If they lost but took second place in the division, I had to have something ready for that. If they lost and Winnipeg and St. Louis both won, they would take third and I had to have an article in the can for that. So while I’m working the Final Four for job #3, I’m keeping tabs on the Preds via my phone for job #2 so I could hit “publish.”

Once Colton Sissons bagged that empty net goal, I started to fill in the final score, the goal scorers and how many saves Pekka Rinne had made. The final horn sounded (probably, I mean, I couldn’t hear anything thanks to the environment I was in) and the post went live.

Now that the Predators had won the Central, I could turn my attention back to the game in front of me. A game that wasn’t nearly as exciting as the one before it but it had it’s own set of emerging storylines. Tech’s leading scorer, Jarrett Culver, averaged nearly 19 points per game during the season but was held to only a single point in the first half before finishing with just 10. Their second top scorer, Davide Moretti, averaged close to 12 but only dropped five. So, with the Red Raiders’ big guns struggling, graduate transfer Matt Mooney went off, tying his season high with 22 and essentially willing his team into Monday night.

Now, after the game, most of the media members were busy talking to the players already in the locker room. If you’ve never been in a media scrum before the idea is you need to get as close to the player speaking as possible so you can get clear audio or a good camera shot. But Mooney wasn’t in the room yet so four or five of us were waiting by his stall so we could ensure a good spot.

Moments later, something happened that I’d never dealt with in my nine years covering sports.

When Mooney walked into the room, everybody else abandoned their conversations and migrated over to where the four or five of us smart people had been for 10 minutes. At this moment, I felt somebody’s leg literally wrap around mine. Surely this was an accident but it felt intentional. Now scrums can get real tight, especially in small locker rooms like that after big events. But nobody was looking at me as if to say “Oops, sorry about that” or “Somebody bumped me” so I looked down to see if it truly was what I thought it was. Sure enough, Trysta Krick, a digital media producer for USA Today, had her left leg wrapped around mine in an attempt to force me aside so she could get a good spot in the scrum. My first thought was “Yo, I’m 250 pounds and you are very much not. You cannot move me. It’s not my fault you didn’t plan ahead.” So I stood my ground, Mooney sat down in his stall and everything went back to normal.

This got me thinking, though. Is this what journalism is like in the major markets? People have to literally use physical force to get the spot they want? Why can’t we all be all courteous and respectful of one another? You have a job to do, I have a job to do, we’ve all got jobs to do. If I’m late to a scrum, for example, the last thing on my mind is to shove others aside and disrupt what they’re doing because I need something. No. If I’m late to a scrum, that’s on me. I should’ve planned better. That’s not Steve Layman‘s fault or Adam Vingan‘s fault. If a scrum forms around Pekka Rinne’s locker and Joe Rexrode is late, too bad, man. I love you and if you need audio, I’m happy to send it but you’re late. That’s on you.

Through all this, I realized that it took me nine years to have an experience like that and I’m grateful. I’m grateful that I’ve covered sports in a city that doesn’t feel like it has to resort to the kind of tactics that (obviously) reporters on the national stage feel like they need to resort to.

This is also why I’m willing to mention Trysta by name, by the way, as opposed to keeping it anonymous. In retrospect, I don’t fault her. She’s obviously been conditioned by her professional environment to think that those kind of tactics are necessary just like I’ve been conditioned by my professional environment that those kind of tactic’s are never necessary and, therefore, unfathomable. Furthermore, I’ve seen her work over the years and she’s very good at what she does. I was in several scrums with her this weekend and her questions were on point. Hell, I even started following her on Twitter as a sign of respect and, if you’re a sports fan, I would encourage you to do so as well.

But I digress. In that scrum, Mooney talked about his hot hands, the confidence his coach had in him and how a specific Bible verse all impacted his performance on college basketball’s biggest stage.

I left the Stadium around 1am on Sunday morning and caught a Lyft back to the place I was staying. I crashed pretty fast but, before I dozed off, I realized that I had only been in Minneapolis for 22 hours at that point and holy crap a lot had happened.

On Sunday, each stringer (myself and Mark Meyers of Southern California who was my AP-Radio counterpart for the Stanley Cup Final when Nashville played Pittsburgh in 2017) had to file a National Championship Game preview. Meyers took Virginia’s media availability while I got Texas Tech’s an hour later. We each filed our packages and then had the night off. I found out right before the trip that Ken Jeong was doing a rare stand-up gig (promoting his new Netflix special, no doubt) at Mystic Lake Casino a few miles away Sunday night. But, when I got back to change, I realized how exhausted I was. I could’ve still went to the show but decided to be disciplined and stay in for the night.

As a result, I got 10 hours sleep (!!!) and woke up ready to rock. Monday was here and the National Championship game was upon us.

The game didn’t start until 8:00pm Central but I got to the Stadium around 1:00pm anyway. As a kid, I always longed for being in an empty ballpark or arena. There was just something about the peacefulness yet impending chaos of it that always drew me to that fantasy.

And I wasn’t alone in dreaming that, apparently.

Now that I’ve had the privilege of covering sports for nine years, I don’t take that for granted. I get to stadiums, arenas and other venues early so I can slow down, enjoy it and let my childhood self breathe in that experience, you know?

Anyway, after a seven hour wait, the National Championship Game was here. One of these schools was going to win it’s first ever men’s basketball national championship and the place was electric as a result. Sure, Kentucky fans or Duke fans or North Carolina fans would’ve been excited too, but there’s something to be said for the buzz surrounding a fanbase — or, in this case, two fanbases — that have never won and yet are 40 minutes away from experiencing what that feels like.

The national narrative became “this is going to a boring, defensive matchup.” Virginia and Texas Tech had the best and third best defenses in the country coming into the night and, for the first five minutes, it looked like the narrative was correct. After 5 minutes of play, the Red Raiders led by a whopping score of 3-2.

After that, things picked up. While the Cavaliers led most of the way, Tech roared back to tie with three minutes left. Overtime was required for the first time since 2008 and Virginia came out on top.

Virginia’s Ty Jerome cuts down his portion of the net following UVA’s overtime win against Texas Tech.

The student section went bonkers, the confetti rained down from the ceiling of US Bank Stadium, the band played loud and proud, the trophy was presented at center court, each player took a turn cutting down the net and the NCAA showed their annual “One Shining Moment” video on the screens. It was official: the Cavaliers were bringing a national championship to Charlottesville, Virginia for the first time.

In the locker room afterward, every player was talking, even the bench players who never see the court. Every player to a man had their portion of the net tied around their championship hat and were responding to friends and family who had sent them congratulatory text messages.

One such player was Virginia forward Mamadi Diakite who tried to place a call to a loved one before fielding questions. He didn’t get through so he spoke with us about the disappointment of last year and how that made the championship moment even more special instead.

At around 2:00am local time, I packed up my things and said goodbye to US Bank Stadium. I caught my Lyft ride back to the house and got about two and a half hours worth of sleep before catching my train from Minneapolis to Chicago. From there, I spent an hour in the swanky Amtrak Metropolitan Lounge before I boarded my Chicago to Dyersberg train.

We pulled up to the Dyersberg station around 4:00am Wednesday morning where I jumped in my car and drove home over the next couple hours. From there, I grabbed some quick breakfast and went straight to bed. I had a big night ahead of me on the heels of that long trek home. My wife and I were going to see Ali Wong at The Ryman at 7:00pm and then, when the show was over, I’d walk across the street and cover Game 1 of the Western Conference Quarterfinal series between the Predators and Dallas Stars.

Roman Josi would score first but then Dallas would tally three before PK Subban made a gorgeous move off the halfwall to pull his team within one. Nashville dropped the opening game of the series and, at 1am on Thursday, I packed up to go home after sending all of the necessary audio to AP-Radio and, of course, the Nashville Predators Radio Network (a/k/a “job #4”) as well as all the 102.5 The Game producers and morning show hosts.

I was in my own bed by 2:30am after coming home and watching the highlights of all five playoff games that evening and I couldn’t have fallen asleep faster.

It was all a whirlwind but also an amazing weekend that I’ll never forget.

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ALL PHOTOS AND VIDEO shot by Jeremy K. Gover on location in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
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