Alumni sees `idiocy'
Letter to the Editor
To the student who threw the object onto the floor of the Joyce Center causing a technical foul and costing Notre Dame the basketball game last night and very likely an NCAA berth:
On behalf of all Notre Dame alumni, I would like to thank you so much for your idiocy and immaturity. As a young alum (Law School class of 1994), I, as many of my fellow alums from the early to mid-1990s, have seen Notre Dame athletics (with certain notable exceptions) go from top caliber to the laughingstock of the college sports world. From the so-called "resignation" of Coach Holtz, to the Dunbar episode, to the NCAA inquiry and probation, to the absolute lack of intelligent decision-making on and off the football field by coaches and players alike, to persistent mediocrity in the men's basketball program — we have endured the march from first to worst in humiliating fashion, together with the perpetual barbs and abuse heaped upon us by the many non-alums and Notre Dame-haters of the world.
And now this.
Just when the athletic department delivers to us desperate alumni a rare treat — a winning men's basketball program and a coach with real fire and personality, top notch players with high levels of talent — Mr. Waterboy (and I really want to emphasize the word BOY) decides he is not happy with the call of the officials after having been warned by the coach and those same officials on two prior occasions, throws his "wittle water bottle onto the floor in pwotest." Big move, little man, make a statement! You da man!
So today, when you get up in your paid-for living accommodations at one of the most prestigious universities in the world, put on your little Abercrombie & Fitch outfit that mommy and daddy in Wilmette bought for you this past Christmas and walk to class, think about this — think about all the alums who had to put on a suit and tie and walk into their law firms, brokerage houses, medical offices and accounting firms and hear the jeers from the Michigan, Northwestern and Purdue alums who live and die for moments like this when the Irish really blow it.
Because you blew it for all of us. You blew it for the seniors on Senior Night, you blew it for Matt Doherty, you blew it for the entire men's basketball program, you blew it for all of your fellow students and you blew it for all us alumni who sat at home last night with the fight song CD in our CD players, waiting, hoping and praying for an upset victory and an improbable NCAA berth.
Thanks again, Waterboy!
Mark Laughman
Chicago, Illinois
March 2, 2000
All Viewpoint Stories for Friday, March 3, 2000
