Tiny Emmitsburg deep in Frederick County’s Catoctin Mountains near the Pennsylvania state line isn’t especially well known. During the Civil War, it was set on fire, reportedly to prevent advancing Confederates from resupplying (they instead went to some town 12 miles north called Gettysburg). And Food Network star Bobby Flay once filmed an episode there in which he competed against a local priest. But the area is perhaps best known as being home to Mount St. Mary’s University, the Catholic liberal arts college with a total undergraduate enrollment of fewer than 1,900 students. The school has a long, proud history of 213 years. It is home to the National Shrine Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes. And it hosts one of the largest Catholic seminaries in the country. Not shabby, but not the stuff of widespread fame.
This week, however, the Mount St. Mary’s Mountaineers deserve a bit of national attention. Beginning Thursday, the team at the center of the college basketball universe, not just a Cinderella team in the Big Dance, the NCAA Division I tournament, but a double-Cinderella with teams in both the men’s and women’s brackets. Landing a team in both is not unusual in certain large universities, which collectively spend gazillions (more or less) on sports. The University of Maryland also accomplished that feat this year as did perennial contenders like the University of Michigan, Baylor and Gonzaga. But those schools have 10 times as many students as the Mount.
That’s not to suggest the Mountaineers are likely to come home with the top prize. There are long shots and then there are long-long-long shots, but if any team has the power of prayer behind them, it would surely be the Mount, which graduated not only Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori and Father Edward J. Flanagan of Boys Town fame, but Susan O’Malley, the first female president of an NBA franchise having served in that post for the Washington Wizards until 2007. Basketball and the Mount have long gone together: Jim Phelan was a coaching legend, who was inducted into the National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame, and the Mount has made a splash a half-dozen times before. Local fans may recall they defeated Coppin State in the 2008 tournament, 69-60, in Dayton, Ohio.
Some Marylanders might be forgiven, of course, if they suffer conflicting sentiments in all this. The No. 15 seed Mountaineers — the first Mount women’s team to make the tournament in 26 years — are scheduled to compete in their first game Monday in San Antonio, pits the 15th seed against none other than the University of Maryland Terrapins, the No. 2 seed fresh off their Big Ten Conference title win under Brenda Frese, ESPN’s pick as national Coach of the Year. The 24-2 Terrapins are legit national title contenders. And Coach Frese is beloved in this state (the recent announcement that her 89-year-old father is battling prostate cancer making her success this season all the more inspiring).
Still, there is a lesson here that it is not so much whether you win or lose but how you play the game as sports writer of old, Grantland Rice would say, and there should be a measure of pride in these achievements. In a year of strangeness and loss associated with a pandemic of once-in-a-century proportions, there is some comfort in simply seeing some semblance of normalcy, including watching young adults from across the country and from all walks of life compete at such a demanding team sport as basketball. No, it’s not the same as years past. And maybe it’s another season destined to have an asterisk, but it sure beats last year when March Madness had to be canceled altogether.
So, go Mountaineers. And Terrapins. And, yes, all those other teams. And go all you experts with your bracket predictions, your office pools and friendly wagers, and all the rest that goes with college basketball. And for the rest of you sports fans, welcome to the shoulder season that ushers us from football to baseball. Spring is nearly here, and the Orioles home opener against the Red Sox on April 8 isn’t far off. Better times are surely ahead, win, lose or draw.
The Baltimore Sun editorial board — made up of Opinion Editor Tricia Bishop, Deputy Editor Andrea K. McDaniels and writer Peter Jensen — offers opinions and analysis on news and issues relevant to readers. It is separate from the newsroom.