Monday evening, just as Wisconsin took a 3-2 lead over Duke in the national championship basketball game, the electricity flickered three or four times and the house went dark. “Oh what cruel trick of nature could this be?” Surely it will be back any moment I thought, after all, this IS the championship game that’s on my giant flat-screen tv! Horror of horrors, it didn’t happen!
My mind raced. Could this be the “BIG ONE”? The end of civilization? Should I race out and plant some vegetables to live on? How long until they are big enough to eat? Maybe I should trap a deer, or a squirrel. Instead I grabbed for my battery-operated portable radio. Fortunately the batteries were good. I could do an Eveready commercial!
Now you would think there would be LOTS of radio stations broadcasting that game. NOT! Plenty of country music, rock music, talk shows and commercials but only ONE radio broadcast of that game and it wasn’t very good! I had to strain to hear it as the signal kept drifting in and out. Sometimes the game was clear as a bell and sometimes it was from some distant station like Del Rio, Texas, where some guy alternated between selling salve that cures all ills and preaching the Bible to me! It was a frustrating way to keep track of big Frank Kaminsky and the Wisconsin Badgers!
All of this brought back memories of when I was a kid. Listening to a scratchy radio signal was how we followed our favorite teams. No flat screen television. In fact, no television! Just late-night radio stations (many closed up shop at sunset) with scratchy sounds but it was heaven to a hero-worshipping youngster.
What memories! In 1951, the Kansas State Wildcats made it to the national championship game against Kentucky. Even though K-State lost 68-58, I was in awe, huddled around the radio. In 1957, I had become enamored with Wilt Chamberlain and the Kansas Jayhawks, “Wilt The Stilt” and his fellow Jayhawks were in the national championship game against the 31-0 North Carolina Tar Heels, led by All American Lennie Rosenbluth. In what was arguably the best championship game of all-time, North Carolina won 54-53 in THREE overtimes! Joe Quigg made two free throws with just seconds left to reverse what looked like a sure Kansas win.
That championship game was played in Municipal Auditorium in Kansas City and the attendance was only 7,778 and very little television.  My, how things have changed. For the better? Not entirely.
The magic of those games was relived for me Monday night. I am GLAD my electricity was off for almost all of the game. It reminded me of pleasant memories. It reminded me that radio announcers do a better job of actually talking about THE game than do television talking heads. They create a magical aura in the mind of the listener. Magic that watching a tv screen cannot duplicate. They paint a picture in the listener’s mind that lasts forever.
The next day, anxious to talk about my experience, I came across a group of ladies that I thought to be sports fans and I asked, “What did you think of that game last night?” One of them said, “What game?”  Incredulously I said, “The national championship basketball game.” She looked me straight in the eye and said, “Basketball! I don’t watch basketball. I was watching  SWAMP PEOPLE!
Swamp People? Is that a monster show? A fishing show? Certainly doesn’t sound like it has anything to do with basketball. Do you suppose, someday far in the future, she will be able to recall fond memories like I just did on Monday night? Memories of SWAMP PEOPLE?