What do you do when your team is 3-24 this year? You go to the game to watch the band.

Of course I am being a little bit facetious It wasn’t just the band, it was the cheerleaders, students and old friends you see. Oregon State is not my alma mater, but my first love. I was a fan, listening to football and basketball games on the radio religiously when I was living at home. I was born and grew up Corvallis and the town was all about the university.

Despite my feelings towards OSU, I made the best choice for the time pursuing a degree at a much smaller, regional university. It was a far better fit for what I needed at the time I was going to school. I am a fan of my alma mater too, we simply get no real news coverage outside the region, radio is highly local and certainly no TV time. Sure, I could follow along with the internet but it is four hours away effectively eliminating any in-person attendance.

Being 47 now, there have been some ups and a lot of downs. My dad worked across the street from the University and his company were big boosters. The four founders of his company were all OSU grads in Engineering. Because of that, he would get tickets once a year and we would go to a basketball game. I saw the glory years of OSU basketball with AC Green and Gary Payton. My former boss played in the middle of those two. During those years, they were in conference title position every year.

The truth is, last year was the best year in my entire memory of Beaver basketball. Maybe not in totality, but they were an elite eight team in the NCAA tournament, really the only thing that matters. I went to a basketball game last year were the Beavers played University of Oregon and dominated the game. The Ducks were the defending conference champions and I believe made it to the sweet 16 last year as well. So, that was a statement of the quality of the team.

I checked back in the record book, this is the lowest win total since 1918 (3-13). By win percentage, this is the worst season ever. There have been some bad ones along the way. 2016-17 they were 4-24. I also remember that they lost the opening game to the local university, badly. Of course, that was the year that Western Oregon University was in the Division II final four. Maybe, it was a calamity of circumstances.

Despite their record, they didn’t play like they were the worst team in the history of the program. In fact, OSU was ahead nearly the entire game. It was only with 15 seconds remaining that the game was tied and went into overtime. At halftime, they were ahead by 12. The opponent definitely made the right adjustments and had the right strategy to exploit OSU.

End Your Programming Routine: As a true fan, I didn’t mind seeing a bad team because it was a good game and we had hope up until the last minute of OT. The last time I was at a women’s basketball game, we had to wait over an hour just to get out of our parking spot. That was frustrating. Taking my son to the game, this was a chance to imagine what college life might be like if he wanted to play in the band or just as a student. It is exciting, no matter what your record is.