And Then There Were Four Winner of the Merrill and Marjorie Swedlund Award for Journalism by Josh Flynn

And Then There Were Four Winner of the Merrill and Marjorie Swedlund Award for Journalism by Josh Flynn Downtown Indianapolis is still asleep on a cold and wet Saturday morning in early April. It’s the official start of the Women’s College Basketball Final Four weekend--the first time the city has hosted the event—and there is nary a basketball fan to be found. Here and there a few people move about. In the White River State Park men haul crates of basketballs from a U-Haul truck. Others struggle against the wind to erect a tent in preparation for the Circle City Dribble, an event where fans dribble the balls from the park to the RCA Dome. Outside of the convention center, which has been renamed Hoop City for the weekend, a few employees are propped against the wall, relaxed. They smoke cigarettes and await the expected rush of fans. Security guards have set up entrance points to the RCA Dome. Some people are already slowly making their way in, ready to watch the open practices and line up for autographs. On the other side of the Dome, the box office is preparing for a big day as people from Tennessee, Michigan State, Baylor (Waco, TX), and Louisiana State pick up their tickets. Somewhere in Indianapolis four basketball teams are waking, eating breakfast, and getting ready to officially start their Final Four experience. By noon, Indianapolis is crawling with women’s basketball fans. A battalion of people wearing Tennessee orange are here. LSU purple can be seen in abundance. To a lesser extent Michigan State green and Baylor gold dot the landscape. Swirled in with the primary colors of the weekend are a number of proud Connecticut fans dressed in American flag navy. Handfuls of other schools can be found, ranging from Kentucky to Virginia, Florida to Wisconsin, Texas Tech, Purdue, and Notre Dame. Then there’s the cavalcade of young girls sporting grey T-shirts celebrating state championships won all over the nation. And the basketball players, towering over everyone else, some dressed like they’re attending an important business meeting, and to them, perhaps the largest stage their sport has to offer outside of the Olympics is just that. Everyone moves and mingles across downtown Indianapolis, all brought here by their love of women’s basketball, ready to rejoice in this pocket universe where for four days the only thing that matters is their passion for the women’s game. And perhaps winning a championship. Tennessee orange speckles the stands of the Dome at 10 A.M on Saturday, their fans waiting for the start of open practices, an event which allows anyone to come in and watch the teams in person as they prepare for the games. The Lady Volunteers are in their fourth straight Final Four and sixteenth overall. They are led by head coach Pat Summitt, who recently became the all time winningest coach in college basketball—breaking former North Carolina men’s coach Dean Smith’s record of 879 wins with a second round victory over Purdue. They have won six titles, the most by any women’s program, but they have not tasted a championship since 1998. Sportswriter John Walters once called them the Death Star of women’s college basketball, going on to say their home arena was the place teams come to die. Tennessee fans are highly optimistic despite the recent drought of championship gold. For the first time in six years their hated arch-rival, Connecticut, is missing from the field. UConn has defeated the Lady Vols in four of the last five tournaments—three of those losses coming in the championship game. To make things even sweeter this time around, Tennessee players Shyra Ely and Shanna Zolman, both Indiana natives and former Miss Basketballs, have a chance to win a title in their home state. The LSU Tigers have returned to the Final Four for a second straight year. Last year their dream crashed to a halt at the hands of Tennessee. A Lady Vol stole the LSU inbounds pass and scored an uncontested lay up for a last second win. The Baylor Bears and the Michigan State Spartans are newcomers to the scene. Baylor was just seconds away from making the 2004 Final Four, but a controversial foul call put Tennessee on the free throw line with two tenths of a second left. Both free throws were hit and Baylor’s season was over. But now the Bears are the pride of Waco, giving their school something positive after their men’s team fell from grace when one player was accused of murdering another. Until this season, Michigan State had never made it out of the second round of the tournament. After a hard fought win over Stanford, the number one team in the country, the Spartans have defied their critics and landed in Indianapolis. Around the Dome’s concourse people are already lining up for autographs. A short collection of people await the players from Baylor, while a line for Tennessee is extending a quarter of the way around the Dome. There are middle aged people wearing orange hats covered with Lady Vols buttons, little kids wearing home made shirts with their favorite player’s name painted on them, and elderly fans dressed in orange sweaters. While waiting, they marvel at the size of the ever growing line and chat with the people around them. “Are you from Tennessee?” “My favorite player is Alexis.” “I’m a bit worried about this Michigan State team.” “Did you watch Connecticut get beat by Stanford? Wasn’t that great?” The open practices begin with LSU hitting the floor first. One Tennessee fan ventures out of line to watch and returns a half hour later to her friends, shaking her head after seeing center Sylvia Fowles. “Fowles is in there showing off and dunking.” The autograph sessions are set up to move fast so as many people as possible can get signatures. Very limited interaction takes place between fans and players. Most players give a hello or a smile, if there is time for it. Only the Michigan State players deviate from this. They take their time, lazily signing their names as if they hope to gain an edge over the other teams by avoiding writer’s cramp. The Baylor line is short and the players are finished signing posters long before their time is up. The Tennessee fans, with their overgrowing line, find humor in this. “How long did it take Baylor to finish their autograph session?” One fan asks. “Two tenths of a second,” someone replies, mocking Baylor’s controversial loss to Tennessee in last year’s tournament. “What’s ironic is Tennessee beat both Baylor and LSU on last second shots last year,” adds another. “Now Baylor and LSU have to play each other in order to play Tennessee for the championship.” When Tennessee finally comes out, their fans have been waiting over two hours. Teams are allotted a half hour to sign autographs, and Tennessee’s line is winding so far around the Dome it is unlikely everyone will get a chance to get signatures. The players sit side by side down a row of tables. Pat Summitt waits at the very end, her autograph the icing on the cake for many people. A Dome employee hands the first player a poster and she signs it and passes it on to the next while accepting another poster. The posters are passed from one to the other and eventually handed to the waiting fan at the end of the table. The procedure is fool proof and flows nicely, unless cursed with sitting next to a fast writer. Sidney Spencer hurries through a never ending pile of posters growing beside her as her teammate, Shyra Ely, quickly writes her name. “Quit scribbling,” Spencer laughs. Ely smiles and continues to drape a quick and sloppy signature over her picture. At Hoop City, Danielle has been waiting patiently in line at Cingular’s Retro Hall of Hoops for a chance to meet her idol, Sheryl Swoopes--former Women’s National Basketball Association MVP, three time Olympian, and record holder for most points scored in a women’s college championship game with 47. Danielle is an African American teenager who has just finished up her high school basketball career. She currently plays AAU ball while looking for a university where she can continue her career. She is also an employee at the convention center and should be working instead of standing in line. “I’m her biggest fan,” she tells a pack of five middle aged women from New Mexico. “I’ve been watching her since I was a little girl. I even bought a pair of her shoes.” Hoop City is located next door to the RCA Dome in the convention center. It celebrates the game of basketball and corporate sponsorship equally. Along the walls are mock buildings. There is The Minute Maid Sweet Sixteen Art Gallery, which houses a small collection of artwork celebrating women’s sports created by local girls. If you want food you go to The Kraft Food and Family Center. After eating, you could go rock climbing next door or walk over to the Pontiac dealership a few stores down. In the center is a replica of the Final Four court, surrounded on both sides by stands. A massive line of people extends from center court to the entrance, wrapping around a DJ’s booth located under one basket. An MC walks up and down the line with a microphone, talking to people and encouraging them to dance.

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