Why Michigan's softball team knocks it out of the park

John U. Bacon — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 11:32:29 +0000

The University of Michigan softball team won the Big Ten title this year – for the fifth year in a row, and 15^th time overall. It went to the NCAA tournament – for the 18^th straight season. Winning titles is what they do.

And this was not even one of head coach Carol Hutchins’ best teams.

The Almighty Cleavers: a softball team built to lose

John U. Bacon — Fri, 27 May 2011 12:10:15 +0000

http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/michigan/local-michigan-970827.mp3

I went to Ann Arbor Huron High School, considered by all objective sources to be the greatest high school in the history of the universe. And one of the things that made it so great was an intramural softball league.

Maybe your clearly inferior high school had one, too. But the IM softball league at Huron was created and run entirely by students – the burnouts, no less. That meant the adults, perhaps wisely, wanted nothing to do with it.

So the burn-outs got the park permits – God bless ‘em -- and every clique had a team, with names like the Junior Junkies, the Extra Burly Studs, and – yes – the ‘Nads. If you pause to think of their cheer, you’ll get the joke.