AJC > Sports > Blog > Archives > 2008 > April > 16
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Remembering Virginia Tech
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
In many ways it feels like yesterday.
In other ways it seems like a lifetime ago.
But it was a year ago today that the horrible word came from Virginia Tech that 32 sons and daughters and mothers and fathers had been murdered by one sick individual.
I’m thinking about Virginia Tech today and all of the parents whose hearts are breaking for the millionth time since getting the awful news.
I’m thinking about the incredible resilience of the students at Virginia Tech who were determined that one madman was not going to destroy what they loved about their university. When the television cameras showed up and indulged in the inevitable excesses of the 24-hour news cycle, we didn’t see young people wringing their hands and falling apart. What we saw was a steely resolve. I was very impressed by those kids.
And I’m thinking about the role that football played in the healing process. Head coach Frank Beamer and his staff gathered the Virginia Tech players together and when all were accounted for, he called off the rest of spring practice. He told his players to take as much time as they needed away. If they wanted counseling, he would get it for them.
Then he challenged them. The coming weeks and months would be difficult for everybody. But there was going to come a time when collectively, Virginia Tech would have to move forward. The Sept. 1 season opener against East Carolina would be such a time and Beamer wanted his men to be ready to do their part.
They were. I’ve spoken to a number of people who were in Blacksburg that day and they told me it was one of the most emotional experiences they could ever remember. That wound, of course, will never be completely healed. But that day told everybody at Virginia Tech that it was okay to keep on.
My main point is this. There are a lot of problems with college football. All of us, this writer included, sometimes take the game far too seriously.
But for all the excesses of college football, and there are many, there is so much more that is good. At its core, college football unites large numbers of people in a way that no other sport can. It brings families together on beautiful fall afternoons. It reunites long, lost friends and helps others to maintain friendships year after year.
My best two friends in the world are Carl Brantley and Tom McMillen. College brought us together 30 years ago but college football has kept us together because I know I will see them every year at the Georgia-Florida game in Jacksonville. You can’t put a price tag on something like that.
When Virginia Tech needed help a year ago, college football was there to play a small, but significant, role in helping that campus deal with its grief. It’s just another reason we love the game.
