The image is indelible: The buzzer goes off, the shot goes in, the coach’s face goes bright red as he runs onto the floor to hug the first person he can find, the players pile on each other like a group of belly-floppers attempting to recover a fumble, and the student section storms the court in a sea of emotion jumping up and down, placing one finger in the air and screaming into the first camera they see. The clock has struck, and stuck, at 11:59 and one lucky little Cinderella has just punched her ticket to the ball.
We never know where they’re going to come from, but we always know there will be at least one. An otherwise unknown team who manages to win their conference Championship and guarantee themselves a chance to compete in the NCAA Tournament. We call that team Cinderella.
But, where is Cinderella born? In a far way magical land of dwarves and witches? Wait, wrong fairy tale. In a far away magical land of evil step-sisters, charming princes, and fairy God-Mothers? No, actually. It turns out that Cinderella may in fact be born on the mean streets of Brooklyn. And her name may just be Long Island University Brooklyn Campus Blackbirds.
Which, is an image far less delible. An image of a team playing to a half-full gym, in an early non-conference game, grinding out a win that is at best hard-fought and at worst sloppy. This is the life of Cinderella before she gets her chances to wear those glass slippers. When she’s still sporting gym shoes and learning how to find her spots against a 2-3 zone.
These early season grind-fests are not the made-for-TV moments. The ones that get repeated and repeated and then re-repeated in the Top 10 as redundantly as the word re-repeated. These are not the moments that define March Madness. Not the moments that introduce us to our beautiful princess, our Cinderella.
But these are the moments that are necessary to get them there. The moment when a team that was last in its league last year begins it season by coming together to win their home-opener against a cross-town “rival” who has beaten them each of the last three seasons. The moment when a team that was decimated by injury last year realizes what they learned about each other in tough times, and what putting it together can mean in future times. The moment when a team makes their free-throws during garbage time to prevent the other team from sneaking back into the game and soundly, but dully, secures the win.
These are the moments you never see, but these are the moments that lead to that one shining moment when the country learns who that red-faced coach who had his whole excited family–father, sister, wife, and three kids–come to his opening night game is, who a group of guys from Brooklyn belly-flopping on each other remembering where it all started and how hard they had to work to get there are, and who a swarming student body that supported their team selectively at first and then whole-heartedly when they got the sense something special was going on is. The moment when a nation crowns its newest Cinderella.
Of course, the LIU at Brooklyn Blackbirds were picked by the coaches of NEC conference to finish 11th out of 11 teams this season, did lose it’s top scorer, top rebounder, and all-time 3-pointers made record-holder from last year, starts only one senior, and has only 1 player 6’8” or over. But hey, Cinderella never stopped dreaming, did she?
