Night after night, if you watch the NHL playoffs, you'll notice a pattern. It's Joe Sakic making a lightning-quick goal for Colorado. It's Wayne Gretzky scoring three in one game for the Rangers. It's Pittsburgh's Mario Lemiuex breaking away to put it in the net and keep his Penguins from elimination. It's big players doing big things, stepping up to grab the ring of greatness that separates them from the pack.It is everything the Wings have been missing.Until Friday night.
The phone rang around 3:30 Wednesday afternoon. Paul Boyer, the equipment man, picked it up."Who wears No. 14 for us?" asked Scotty Bowman, the Red Wings coach."Aaron Ward," Boyer said."Make a new No. 14 with the name 'Shanahan.' Give Ward No. 27. You think he'll mind?""No," Boyer said, smiling, "I don't think he'll mind."
ATLANTA -- The race was over, the world record was in pieces, and the loudspeakers were blasting well-chosen rock lyrics -- "You're unbelievable!" The hero of the moment was jogging around the track in golden shoes, with an American flag in his hands and an ice pack on his right leg. The crowd rose to applaud. Now, with the expected miracle behind him, we'll see how much steam this Michael Johnson really has.
Where else would you rather be? It was a sentence that came to Lloyd Carr during the muggy heat of August, when the Michigan football team was sweating through a practice, panting like dogs. "Men," he yelled, "your friends are at the pool, or driving girls around campus, and you're here, working out for football. Where else would you rather be?"
Week after week during this past football season, I would walk into ESPN and see the grinning faces of analysts Joe Theisman and Sterling Sharpe."How 'bout those Lions?" they would yell, and then break up laughing.They would shake their heads, ask me about the latest embarrassment, then ask me to explain again how Wayne Fontes kept his job. And then they'd laugh some more.They are not laughing this morning. They are nodding in admiration. That is the first thing Bobby Ross brings the Lions. He's legit. Everyone stops laughing.
Patience, patience. If there was one lesson learned from the opening of the most anticipated hockey playoffs in Detroit history -- and let's be honest, you shouldn't learn more than one thing from the first game, right? -- it was that patience will not only be a worthy companion on this horse ride through the postseason, it may keep you sane."When already?" Wings fans seemed to ask, as Detroit went scoreless in the first and second periods Wednesday night, and trailed the eighth-seeded Jets by a 1-0 score as the final frame began. "What are you waiting for?"
PHOENIX -- Grant Hill was just a few seconds into his first All-Star Game when he took a pass and tried a jump shot from the corner. It missed. But at least it hit the rim. Considering the pressure he was under, I was surprised it didn't drop out of his hands, as he fainted.
Kirk Gibson was yelling like a banshee. His teammates froze. I still remember that scene, even though I can't tell you the day, can't tell you the opposing team. I can tell you the Tigers had lost several games in a row, during a pennant race, and that was enough to boil Gibson's blood. He was screaming, calling them -- and himself -- names I can't repeat here, pacing like a caged beast, swearing they would never lose again or he'd kill somebody.The other players -- older and younger -- looked up the way children look at a raging parent.They won their next three games.
Mitch Albom writes about running an orphanage in impoverished Port-au-Prince, Haiti, his kids, their hardships, laughs and challenges, and the life lessons he’s learned there every day.
