OT: Most Painful/Heartbreaking Sports Memories?
The Lions loss in the NFC Champ game made me think about the following topic: what are your most painful/heartbreaking sports memories (my earliest sports memories start in 1993, so I obviously didn't see/remember other famous heartbreaks like Bird's steal vs Isiah or Laimbeer's phantom foul)?
Mine:
- 1993: Chris Webber's Timeout
- 2013: Ortiz's grand slam in game 2 of the ALCS against the Tigers
- 2024: Lions NFC Championship game collapse
- 2016: Michigan vs OSU: self inflicted wounds and the refs
- 1998: NCAA tourney loss to UCLA
- 2021: Elite Eight loss to UCLA
- 2006: late hit out of bounds vs OSU
- 1993: Toronto beats Red Wings in OT in game 7
- 2005: Rasheed leaves Horry wide open for 3 in OT, Game 5 of the NBA Finals
I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting, but these are the main ones that come to mind for me.
February 4th, 2024 at 12:27 PM ^
Just realized I left out an obvious one: 2022 TCU loss
February 4th, 2024 at 3:16 PM ^
January 8, 2024 has caused that game to hurt much less for me. Now I just see it as a step in our rise to the top.
February 4th, 2024 at 3:16 PM ^
J.T. Barrett. Enough said.
February 4th, 2024 at 10:37 PM ^
Yup. 2016 robbery in the Shoe. Everyone talks about JT being short as if that was the "controversy" of the game. He was short, but that was the least egregious of the calls to go against UM that game. The one sided officiating cost a superior UM team a shot at their first playoff bid.
UM football is my passion and the one sport that can truly gut me. In the worst football years, I had Beilein and UM basketball, at least, to keep me sane. Hence...
1) 2016 UM @ OSU ; For B1G championship game and probable playoff - Robbery in the Shoe
2) 2006 UM @ OSU ; (#2 vs #1) for BCS National Title birth
3) 2015 MSU @ UM ; Punt 6 Dong punch against fluke Sparty
4) 2022 UM vs. TCU ; Choke job, lost to an inferior team
5) 2013 Basketball National Title: UM vs. Louisville ; UM had it in the 1st half, crap officiating in the 2nd, Title vacated by Pitino's dirty program
February 5th, 2024 at 3:23 PM ^
Yep, people just try to boil that game down to the spot (mainly OSU fans) but that was far less maddening then every judgement call in the game going against UM and nothing being called on OSU. They straight up were tackling receivers before the ball was even there. Not to mention having two refs with Ohio ties and another who admitted in his book to having a bias against Harbaugh. That game was a total screw job in every way, shape and form and boiling it down the spot is severely understating the magnitude of it.
February 4th, 2024 at 12:29 PM ^
1994 Colorado. I was there in person.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:00 PM ^
That was my first Michigan game I attended...
Not a real heartbreaker... but it was the Big Ten basketball tourney in Indy when Evan Turner sunk a just over half court shot for the win over Michigan in the first round. I recall seeing the shot go up and basically started walking for the exit because it looked good from the moment it left his hand...
The upside from that loss was a wild drinking afternoon in the beer tent outside Lucas Oil! So good that the next day when I showed up hungover... all the bartenders were calling me by my first name... I made quite the impression!
February 4th, 2024 at 1:07 PM ^
As was I. A loud 100k going deathly silent is what I will never forget. You could hear a pin drop…
February 4th, 2024 at 2:59 PM ^
I was there also, thanks for reminding me.
Never heard the Big House so silent....
February 4th, 2024 at 11:10 PM ^
I was there as a young guy with my Grandfather celebrating his 50th class reunion or something similar.
As we lost, the majority of the people around me were so old they weren't even paying attention to the game. I screamed at some old man who told me I should have been a Michigan fan. "You old fart, we lost!!" was more or less what I shouted
I was probably 10 rows from where Westbrook caught the pass deflection. I had literal nightmares for weeks thinking what if I had launched myself into the field to break it up. (I know not realistic, but dreams are not subject to gravity, etc).
That sucked.
February 4th, 2024 at 3:24 PM ^
That '94 team was loaded - national championship caliber. And we had just gotten over the ND hump the week before, winning in South Bend on Hamilton's kick.
The Hail Mary was devastating, and the team never seemed to recover emotionally. It limped to an 8-4 finish.
I remember people before the '97 season arguing that our program still hadn't recovered from that game. Fortunately that season helped to bury some demons.
February 4th, 2024 at 6:31 PM ^
I forgot about that one... I was there in person too
February 4th, 2024 at 6:46 PM ^
I attended all three of those Michigan-CU games.
I’ve mentioned this here before, but a few days after the 1994 game I was running on the Boulder Creek path (which runs adjacent to part of campus) and I encountered Bill McCartney, walking opposite me. I was wearing a Michigan shirt (what else?) and he just very briefly looked at me and smiled. I thought it was classy.
Their fans were anything but—until the “rematch” in their stadium in 1996. Then the 1997 game was pure redemption in the form of a beat down.
February 5th, 2024 at 9:56 AM ^
I was there also, had a clear view of Kordell Stewart's arm motion (was sitting at the same yard line) and then in the distance saw the ball pop up. The worst I have ever felt physically after a game, literally nauseous, took weeks to recover.
February 5th, 2024 at 3:07 PM ^
That was my Freshman year, and like others have said, I have never heard 100,000 people be so quiet. And then the reverse when Colorado came back to the big house and again threw up a hail mary at the end of the game and it wasn't caught. Everyone went nuts.
February 4th, 2024 at 12:32 PM ^
Trouble with the snap - in the stadium with thousands of you all
Luke Hancock murdering us in 2013 and stealing the potentially iconic spike albrecht national championship from Michigan’s most talented team since the Fab 5
February 4th, 2024 at 12:39 PM ^
When Spike drilled one from Curry range, I thought we were on our way to a Disney movie.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:00 PM ^
Ugh, YES, Trouble with the Snap. How could I forget that??
I thought about putting the Luke Hancock game, which was heartbreaking, but for some reason didn't rise to the levels of the other ones I mentioned.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:38 PM ^
2015 MSU for me. It wasn’t the biggest stage but I really questioned my life priorities after that one lol.
February 4th, 2024 at 2:42 PM ^
I changed mine after that game. My first son was just 18 months at the time and I realized I couldn’t get that wrapped up in sports anymore. I’ve been able to stick to that commitment pretty well. Now that he’s nine it’s fun taking him and my 6 year old along for the sports rides, but doing so with a fairly muted fandom compared to my old self.
February 5th, 2024 at 5:25 PM ^
Felt the exact same way after that one. I've never witnessed such stunned silence from so many people. I also heard that someone in the stadium had a heart attack after the play. Unsure if true, but if true I sure hope he recovered and was around to enjoy the natty.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:55 PM ^
Luke who?
Was he the ref?
February 4th, 2024 at 2:42 PM ^
Will always be too soon.
the picture doesn’t even do the play justice. Trey went straight up. There was zero interpretation to conclude this was a foul, yet conclude the ref did!
February 4th, 2024 at 7:44 PM ^
Once he hit the 1st shot I was screaming in my head deny him the ball so he doesn’t get hot.
February 5th, 2024 at 3:25 PM ^
Don't forget that Hancock was only in the game at that point as well because the refs called a foul on the wrong player that would have fouled him out.
February 4th, 2024 at 12:33 PM ^
2024 Harbaugh contract negotiations
February 4th, 2024 at 12:35 PM ^
Treys clean block against Louisville
February 4th, 2024 at 12:37 PM ^
2016 for sure
February 4th, 2024 at 12:40 PM ^
I didn't much care for sports before going to Michigan, so mine would be the spot, the block, and the failed 2pt conversion.
February 4th, 2024 at 12:42 PM ^
mine are both the game
2016 and 2006 still hurt
I was a much younger man in 2006 and actually broke a piece of furniture when OSU kept lining up with 1 more receiver than we had in for DB.... and we never adjusted
2016 was worse because we actually won (I didn't break anything other than my heart)
I have many Lions losses on the list, several Redwings playoff series and then there is the Isiah Thomas game against the showtime Laker's..... but they all pale to my Michigan fandom
February 4th, 2024 at 12:44 PM ^
The 1972 plane crash of the Uruguayan Rugby team was pretty sad. The 1970 Marshall football team plane crash was pretty sad as well.
In fiction, from the movie "The Sum of All Fears," the NFL game that was nuked by Russian separatists killing all 80,000 fans and both teams was tragic. Very sad.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:07 PM ^
I think you're a Faux sports fan!
February 4th, 2024 at 1:27 PM ^
The sum of all fears is a pretty badass movie, very under-rated
February 4th, 2024 at 12:46 PM ^
What an uplifting way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Hard pass.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:01 PM ^
Right? Next, let’s relive all of our beloved pets who died, and then let’s go all 2020 again and relive COVID.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:26 PM ^
But first, a word from our sponsors, cyanide incorporated…
the hemlock companies
and the folks at the noose rope company
February 4th, 2024 at 1:43 PM ^
Yeah but at least this time we can say “…but we’re on top of the college sports world, so it’s all good.”
February 4th, 2024 at 12:48 PM ^
2015 MSU- I think this hurt most
2015 Bengals loss in wild car to Pittsburgh
2016 OSU
2018 OSU
2021 Bengals Super Bowl loss
22 Bengals AFCC loss to chiefs
February 4th, 2024 at 6:04 PM ^
2015 Bengals loss in wild car to Pittsburgh
I’m not familiar with this one. Did the wild car run over Bengals players or fans? Were people killed?
February 4th, 2024 at 12:57 PM ^
- Elite 8 loss to UK (because I lived in Lexington at the time and still nearby)
- 2022 TCU semifinal loss that was so avoidable
- 2018 OSU just dismal
- 2016 OSU
- 2006/07 Rose Bowl to USC (just thought UM had a chance to prove they belonged with the elite still and laid an egg in the second half. The OSU game that year didnt hurt as much at the outset since they were #1, it was away, it was a back and forth game, I thought we still had a punchers chance at an NC game rematch considering all the criteria and circumstances)
- 2015 MSU (more just the shock, especially considering MSU owned us at that point for almost a decade it felt like a curse)
- 2013 BBall NC game loss to Louisville (just let all the air out of the bag)
- 2004/05 loss to Vince Young in Rose Bowl (another chance to prove a little national prowess and threw it down the drain)
- 2001/02 Citrus bowl loss to Tennessee
(This one was deeply personal since I was still just 12 and it was my first experience as a following fan watching Michigan lose a bowl game, and they did so in such pathetic fashion with Jason and Witten and Casey Clausen making the defense look stupid. My UM watching started in about 1997 when I was 8 and grew each year from there. Dad is a fan since the early 60s and alum so i remember being indoctrinated to love Michigan since I could talk, even if I wasn’t watching or following yet)
February 4th, 2024 at 8:04 PM ^
The Tennesse game in the Citrus Bowl was just a mismatch. UM was decent, one of the weaker Carr teams (no offense to any of those players). Tennessee was on their way to the BCS title game until LSU upset them in the SEC championship game. Somehow Tennessee, who was ranked #2 entering the SEC title game, fell all the way to the Citrus Bowl.
February 4th, 2024 at 12:58 PM ^
Way back in 1979 at a soccer practice at the local park, I ran over to kick a ball that had found its way into a patch of tall grass. I ended up kicking a log that was hidden below and blew out my knee. That was painful!
I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting, but that's the main one that comes to mind.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:08 PM ^
And that was the moment you turned from soccer player to marine biologist I bet.
February 4th, 2024 at 2:00 PM ^
February 4th, 2024 at 3:16 PM ^
Not at all. Just thought you might've made one heck of an architect.
February 4th, 2024 at 4:05 PM ^
You know I always wanted to pretend I was an architect!
February 4th, 2024 at 12:59 PM ^
2024 Lions blowing a 17pt lead with a chance to go to there 1st Superbowl
February 4th, 2024 at 1:01 PM ^
I fully expected the lions collapse, but it still hurt. And I’m not even a lions fan
February 4th, 2024 at 1:03 PM ^
The Game, 2016. That one hurt.
Also, The Game, 2013.
February 4th, 2024 at 1:04 PM ^
The 1972 and 1973 Ohio State games - one of my best friends played for Michigan and I was there for both. Very tough loss and tie, even more so in ‘73 with the subsequent Rose Bowl vote.