time in November, which meant he
could train hard through the SEC
meet for once and be peaking right
in time for the NCAAs. The whole
plan was in place.
All three of our kids have been
college swimmers. The oldest,
Mitchell, competed at Missouri
from 2013 to ’17. The youngest,
Brooke, is a junior at Stanford—she
lost the end of her season as well.
But here’s the thing about
Clayton: He loves the sport the
most of the three kids. He has
notebooks filled with goal times
and actual times—not just his, but
his teammates’. He would like to
become a teacher and coach. He’s
had a wonderfully fortunate life in
a thousand different ways that are
more important than swimming,
but I’m feeling this gut punch for
him in a most acute way.
It’s perfectly appropriate for
every sports fan to experience a
sense of loss this spring. The NCAA
tournament has been a vital part of
the American sporting fabric for
damn near as long as any of us can
remember, contested for 81 straight
years—through World War II and
Vietnam, through racial unrest and
economic uncertainty.
President Ronald Reagan was
shot on the day of the 1981 NCAA
title game, and that night they
played basketball in Philadelphia—
Indiana defeated North Carolina
for the title. The Big Dance had
endured everything. Until now.
The coronavirus undid March
Madness, and that
hurts. We can all
commiserate.
But give a good
thought to the college
seniors in every sport,
even the obscure ones.
They all worked hard
to get where they
are. They all deserved
a far better endingthan this. (^) ¼
EEING VERY clearly where
things were headed, I
called my son Clayton at
2:30 p.m. on March 12. Wanted to
make sure he was O.K.
He’s a senior at Georgia, and
his college swimming career was
coming to an abrupt, premature,
heartbreaking end. His last meet as
a Bulldog was supposed to be the
NCAA championships the last week
of March in Indianapolis, but the
handwriting was on the wall.
Clayton is smart but stoic, so
the conversation was brief and
fact-based. As the coronavirus
turned into a wildfire that
consumed everything in its
path, he could foresee the likely
outcome. He noted that his coach
was still thinking the meet could
go on. Clayton was maintaining
some slim hope.
But less than two hours after our
call, that hope was extinguished:
The NCAA announced that all of its
winter and spring championships
were canceled.
I’m sorry, son.
I’m sorry for every other NCAA
championship–bound senior in
every other winter and spring
sport, all of whom had their
college careers end in a completely
unimaginable way. I’m sorry for the
ones you’ve heard of, like Cassius
Winston and Sabrina Ionescu, but
also for the ones you haven’t. I’m
sorry for the wrestlers and the
runners and the rowers and the
softballers, all of whom worked (and
worked, and worked) to get to this
point. And, yes, for all the senior
swimmers our family has gotten to
know and love and cheer for.
You all deserve a better send-off.
Every athlete’s career comes
with an expiration date, and the
lucky ones can delay that for a long
time. My kid was lucky enough
to swim past the expiration date
for most of his high school peers
and competitors. He will keep
swimming through the Olympic
trials in June, which is awesome,
though he’s not a strong candidate
to make the U.S. team. The NCAA
championships were going to be his
last big hurrah.
For the uninitiated, swimming
works differently than almost every
other sport. Swimmers train to peak
just once or twice a year, putting
everything on those few races. In
previous years, Clayton had trained
to peak at the SEC championships,
hoping to swim a time fast enough
in his best event, the 400-yard
individual medley, to qualify for the
NCAA meet a month later.
As a senior he swam a qualifying
BITTER
END
BY PAT FORDE
POINT AFTER
LOST FINALES FOR
COLLEGE SENIORS ARE
A GUT PUNCH
80 SPORTS ILLUSTRATED
S
COU
RT
ESY
(^) OF
(^) PA
T (^) F
ORD
E
FULL STOP
Clayton Forde (center), son of
Pat (left), saw his collegiate
swimming career end abruptly.