Final thoughts on the 2009 State Tournament

I'll start with my experiences on press row at the state tourney.

• All the Pepsi that I could drink. That alone makes the weekend worthwhile.
  
• For those who didn't like Tech vs Hopkins in the 1st half, you're completely nuts. Great chess match there. Great crowd from Tech helped too.
• Hopkins really didn't play well in either of the last 2 games and still won relatively easily. Definitely the best Minnesota team I've ever seen in my short time on the wrong side of the Mighty Mississippi.
• That class A title game with GHEC and Ellsworth was terrific especially in the 2nd half. Despite the fact that GHEC drove me nuts in the 1st half by shooting outside shots and my bad perception of their schedule, after seeing them twice, they definitely were worthy.
• Cole Olstad is that good. Its a shame he won't be on the AAU circuit.
  
• Love the Ada-Borup Band. Honorable mention here to the Chisholm guitarist who did a 5-star restaurant quality rendition of Metallica's Enter Sandman on Friday morning about an hour before the game before he was inexplicably told to stop.
  
• Spike the Bulldog from St. Bernard's on TV, great stuff. Honarable mention for the hideous Viking from Pelican Rapids. Scary looking, but appropriate. Dishonorable mention to the Osseo Penguin.
  
• At least 4 schools had kids chant "B(%*$*@!". Be better than that, especially when TV is there.
• A media guy tearing me apart Friday morning for saving a spot for Ryan James with Michael Much sitting there taking it all in and leaving me to the rabid wolf. Welcome to the state tournament rookie. For the record, said unhappy media guy did get an apology in as he left that night. (Czar's note 3/31/09: Michael doesn't believe he was there when this happened. Regardless, the intent here was to make light of my 1st time on press row. Its not a secret that not only do I work for Mike, but he's been one of the biggest supporters of this blog. Its worth noting that he was the one to talked to the upset media guy and that got me the apology mentioned. I apologize to Mike for the omission)
  
• Corollary: I know people want to cover the event, but this concept that anybody who even remotely has an interest can get a press pass is too much. Especially when they don't compare it to the number of available places to put the media. It would certainly make life easier for the nice lady at the Will Call window who had to take 10 minutes to sift through everything to find my media pass.
  
• 152 games is the final number for this season. 1 season down, on to the AAU season. Local events every non-holiday weekend from here until mid-June. Busy schedule.