You do something the same way over time and it ends up either being a bad habit or a tradition. If you spit off the railroad bridge on Halloween night for good luck, that’s a tradition. If you spit on the dining room floor after sampling the pea soup – not so much.
The cameras zoomed in on the student section at the OU-Air Force game Saturday. The issue was the national anthem. Sitting in the student section with my daughter a few years ago, I was singing along (I’m a closet national anthem fan and sing it in the shower) and at the end, when I hit the word “Brave,” others yelled “Sooners!”
I got over my confusion pretty quickly. School spirit is pretty easy to recognize, especially when sitting (I should say “standing,” as we rarely sat) in the student section. When the Air Force Academy came to town this weekend, there was a call by Coach Stoops to “sing it right.”
Stoops is a blue-collar-work-ethic, patriotic, public figure. His discomfort over the altered words is understandable. He’d rather hear cheers on defensive stands to intimidate the opponent. He’s called out the crowd in the past a couple of times, thinking it ought to be a little more raucous at OU games.
It was great to see the television news video after the game. The camera crew pointed their lens at the crowd for the anthem finale and gathered in images of about a dozen singing faces. All I saw was “and the home of the – BRAVE!” It may not have been unanimous, but – then again – it may well have been.
Good for the students, and good for Coach Stoops. Not all school-spirit traditions pan out. Texas A&M students will remember the bonfire that got so out-of-control with tradition, that twelve people died when it collapsed. Singing “home of the Sooners!” isn’t quite so dangerous, obviously. Still, under the scrutiny of outsiders (and even some OU insiders) it was easily depicted as irreverent at best, to the extreme of unpatriotic.
I don’t think Sooner students are unpatriotic. By virtue of the respect and comraderie displayed after the game, there is a wellspring of patriotism for the country and its armed forces, and respect for the opinion of the coach.
Norman is the home of the OU Sooners. They did their administration proud when they made the Air Force Academy and its followers feel at home there. For all the negative views about college athletics, the Saturday activities showed a positive side to fans and fanaticism.
Read about the Home of the Other Traditions!