A Stroll Down Memory Lane (It's right off Broadway)

When the guys @vivathematadors told me I could have the keys to the printing press and write for the website, I did a couple of somersaults (I can’t do backflips) and then racked my brain for a topic that would be earth shattering. After realizing I’m not Don Williams, I started compiling a list longer than the line at the Ave Q Whataburger on a Saturday night.

I decided I should write my first post centered around the sentence me and my fellow Tech alumnus utter to each other everyday…"Remember that time when…" which is usually followed up with "Man, that was a long time ago".

I don’t want to bog you down with a bunch of memories from MY past (I’m about to anyways), but I do want to give the broad scope of readers a reference point to my Tech experience. I graduated in 2007 after four (should have made it five) years in Lubbock and lived through a pretty solid era of Tech sports.

-I rushed the field (at the appropriate time) after "Crabtree’s Catch" and then froze to death weeks later as OU dashed my National Championship hopes in Norman.

-I worked at a t-shirt shop close to campus the season before when Crabtree burst on to the scene, leading us to blow up a GIANT crab inflatable in front of the store to promote the "He-i5-man" shirts for #5.

-I witnessed Dwayne Slay destroy Allen Evridge. That’s my hand-made banner  in the background of the last shot. If you still have NCAA Football 2007, it’s in that exact same spot in the stadium when you play the game.

-Andre Emmett sat next to me in my Intro to Mass Communications class. My roommate and I lost our minds in our Doak dorm room (we were the last ones to live there) when he won the NCAA dunk contest on the dunk we suggested to him at the rec a few days prior.

-Graham Harrell, Martin Zeno, Danny Amendola and Louis Vasquez were all residents in my dorm when I was a Resident Advisor. Honestly, they’re some of my favorite people I met at Tech.

-I watched Benny Wylie bench press a house when I worked at the practice facility. It always blew me away how many notes and plays each position’s meeting room had on the board before each game. (Someone tell Zane Perry I need a new Under Armour hoodie).

-I painted up for three straight years of basketball games (what’s up @armenwilliams). I rushed the court and slammed into Wayne Simien after we beat Kansas on Valentines Day. Love you Dora. We also made the paper for holding up a sign that said "Lettuce Support Coach Knight" after he got into a spat with upper management at a Lubbock salad bar.

-I drove from DFW to Lubbock during the Christmas Break to watch Knight break the all-time wins record, only to have them lose to UNLV and then have to watch it on TV on New Years Day. He told me to "Get off the *expletive* (scorers) table" while I was rushing the court after we beat a #6 Texas A&M in 2007.

-I went to Kyle Field to watch Robert Johnson smoke Jordan Pederson in the corner of the endzone for the game winner. Nice pass protection Shannon.

-I cried when Keith Toogood missed the game winner in Austin in 2003 and again when that random Alabama kicker shanked a 4-iron through the goalposts in the Cotton Bowl.

-I interviewed head coaches like Mike Leach, Marsha Sharpe and Larry Hayes for La Ventana stories. Leach was my favorite.

I saw tons of upsets, blowouts (good and bad), broken records, draft picks, heartbreaks and legends in my short time and I wouldn’t trade those memories for anything. I write all of this not to boast about my 4-year window (yeah, i did), but hopefully to jog your memory of all the awesome Tech sports you’ve seen in person or remember celebrating while watching on TV.

Now that you know me and my story, tell me yours. I’m sure one of you have had a beer with EJ Holub or you’re the guy in the picture of Wes Welker taking it to the house against A&M. Maybe Pat Green was your roommate or you still have a picture with Sheryl Swoopes after they won the title. Whatever it is, let me know what you got. Let’s go win all the National Championships. Wreck ‘Em.