We left Vegas on Friday morning, with a quick stop in El Paso to pick up some passengers, and we got into Dallas at around 1pm. We had our first hotel for two nights, our beloved Embassy Suites!! After looking out the window of our room, we found out we could see AT&T Stadium!! How cool! We wasted no time after settling in, and headed to downtown.
Another fun thing we did in downtown Dallas was go up in Reunion Tower, an observation tower on the Southwest corner of downtown. We love looking out onto new city's, so we were excited to go up! From there, we could see the whole city, including AT&T Stadium, the site of the Final Four! Also, we found out really quickly that Dallas traffic sucked, so I got a really good shot of the traffic from above! And, as it turned out, Friday was the only clear day we saw in Dallas (besides Monday, but we wouldn't have had time to go downtown then), so we were lucky to have gone up when we did!
Saturday was all about the Final Four!! We tried to sleep in as much as we could that day because we knew it was going to be a long one. We found out about a FanFest bus that took us to the stadium from a Park 'N Ride, which was nice because we didn't have to worry about parking by the stadium. So yes, our road to the Final Four began on a bus!! Let me just tell you a little bit about the size of AT&T Stadium. It is very large, a behemoth if you would. It reminded me of a gigantic UFO, something very futuristic!! Before we entered the premise, we had to go get our tickets from a Stubhub kiosk. Before we left our hotel, we checked on the location, and it said that the ticket kiosk was in the parking lot of the stadium, but when we got there, we realized it wasn't. And none of the employees working there seemed to know either. I'm pretty sure we weren't the only ones to inquire. That was frustrating. After Robbie called Stubhub, we found that the kiosk was adjacent from the stadium. So, we went to go pick up our tickets, and we also grabbed some Wisconsin Final Four merchandise.
Our tickets came as a package, including all 3 games, and all of the fan festivities for the weekend. The fan festivities included bands, pep rallies, food, and other basketball-related activities. Saturday was a dreary day, so for those that did partake in the festivities were all huddled together, but it was fun anyway, cheering for your school!
Being Saturday was dreary, there was a pretty long line to get into the stadium, which opened 2 hours prior to tip-off of the first game. Needless to say, we were in that pretty long line. The inside of AT&T Stadium was just as awe-some as the outside. Floods of people kept pouring in, which made for a pretty great scene from above. We found our seats, and settled in for the next seven hours. Now, mind you, AT&T Stadium was built as the biggest and the best, housing the Dallas Cowboys football team, and also the largest jumbotron in the world. Being the stadium is mainly used for football games, the jumbotron spans the length from one 30-yard line to the next, but being they converted the stadium to a basketball arena, the jumbotron was actually longer that the court itself!! Crazy! We had ample time to watch the pre-game that was being filmed in the stadium, and being shown on the big screen. As the crowd started to file in, the anticipation of the games grew bigger and bigger.
Unfortunately I had to wait until the second game for the Badgers to take the court, but we had a really fun first game to watch, in the Florida Gators vs. the UConn Huskies. We were cheering for the Huskies, and they came out the victors of that game with a score of 63-53. It looked like UConn was finished at the beginning, as they were down 4-16, but a huge run helped them out, and they never looked back. One championship team had been named...who would be the second??
We were lucky enough to be sitting by some Badger fans, and a few UConn fans who were going to be rooting for the Badgers, and that made me feel really good. There is nothing like being drowned out at such a big game like the Final Four. The Badgers finally took the court and I was nervous. It felt like I was watching the Packers in the Superbowl (and ironically enough, the last Superbowl the Packers played in was played in this exact same location)! I wasn't going to hold anything back!
Tip-off time was finally here, and my stomach was literally in my throat. Some of you may laugh, but if you have a passion in life, you should know how I felt! The game was back and forth, up and down, just like a rollercoaster, and in true Badger fashion, it was a nail-biter right down to the end. With about 15 seconds left and with the game tied, Kentucky fouled Traevon Jackson at the 3-point line, and Jackson went to the free-throw line to shoot 3. He missed the first (and that was actually the first free throw the Badgers missed all game), and made the second and third. Badgers up 2, Kentucky ball, 15 seconds left on the clock. Kentucky brought the ball to their end of the court, and took 10 seconds off the clock when their freshman, Aaron Harrison threw up a prayer 3, and it went in. 74-73 in favor of Kentucky. My heart sank. There was still 5 seconds on the clock, but to be honest, I didn't have a good feeling about this. I know 5 seconds is a lot of time in basketball to run the ball to your end, set up a shot, and shoot, but I had a feeling. Damn you, woman's intuition! The Badgers put it in Traevon's hands, he went up for the shot, and as if in slow motion, the ball arched, bounced off the rim and backboard, then hit the ground without going through the hoop. I was devastated. One point. One missed free throw. That's all it took. Reliving it as I'm typing this is making me sad even. I was one giant ball of emotions. So extremely happy for the Badgers to make it this far, so blessed to have seen them in the Final Four and the Elite 8 games, so happy for the season that they had, starting 16-0, falling into a 6-game slump, but crawling right back out of it to finish the season strong. This was the best Badger team I have ever seen play the game, and I watched almost every single game. During the season on a gameday, I would get done with work at 4pm, rush over to the Tropicana casino, and plant myself in a chair, cheering them on in every game! It's only fitting that I was there to witness their last game of the season! What a great season, Badgers!! Although, I will admit, I cried. But I wasn't the only fan crying, so that made me feel better.
Sunday, we totally switched gears, and headed down to Houston in pouring-down rain for the Astros/Angels baseball game. The drive between Dallas and Houston is about 4 hours, but it took us a little longer because of practically white-out conditions...from the rain! After 3 stops along the way, we were there. My first impressions of Minute-Maid Park were positive one's. I liked how it had the old-time look and feel to it, and the size of the Park also impressed me! I also really enjoyed the fact that the Park had a roof! Regarding the weather, that was the best part!
We bought tickets in left field, but when we got there, we noticed that there wasn't that much of a crowd, so we moved ourselves about 10 rows up behind homeplate!! That was pretty cool. One of my favorite features of the ballpark was a train and train track above left and center, and whenever the Astros hit a homerun, the train would move down the tracks! We got to see that happen 5 times in that game, which was really impressive because it was the Astros, who had the worst record in baseball last year! They also had a gas pump in left center that kept track of all homeruns that have ever been hit in the ballpark since the Astros played their first game there. Marlon Wayans even threw out the first pitch, and he saluted Robbie when he got his attention!! Cool!! The park also has a hill in center, which is unlike any other ballpark in the majors!! All in all, it was a pretty good game, full of action, with the final score being 7-4. We had a hotel in Houston for that night, and after the game, we literally did nothing. We were happy for the time to relax.
On Monday, we had a much nicer drive back up to Dallas, and we made it with time to spare before heading to the NCAA National Championship game. We actually had so much time to spare, that we went to go tour the Ballpark at Arlington, where the Texas Rangers play. The tour took us into the press box, batting cages, media room and the dugout. It's always fun to go behind the scenes of my favorite sport on earth!
On Monday night, all eyes were on Dallas, or, North Texas for the National Championship game between Kentucky and UConn. There were two things to note in this game, one being that these were the highest combined seeded teams to reach the big game with Kentucky being an 8 seed, and UConn being the 7 seed. The second thing to note is that over the two games, there was an NCAA Tournament record crowd, with over 158,000 people in attendance!! Wow! The weather was much nicer for this game, so we were able to better enjoy the pre-game festivities.
We stayed to watch the trophy presentation and part of the cutting of the nets. The whole scene was surreal. I've seen it on TV dozens of times when the confetti shoots out, the winning team celebrates like they are little kids again, and the star of the game makes his speech. In this case it was UConn's senior Shabazz Napier who was outstanding during the whole tournament, and he seemed just so humble! Way to go!
Being we toured the Ballpark at Arlington before the game, we parked at a hotel nearby, so after the National Championship game, we needed the most efficient way back to our hotel. Robbie once again got inside his map, and not only found the best way out, but he found a route that literally was free-flowing, and we were the only car on the road! I swear that this picture was taken about 15 minutes after we left! We should go on the Amazing Race!
Sometime on Monday night during the game, I felt myself coming down with a cold. It was most likely because of us being run down, being out in the chilly rain, and not getting much sleep. So on our travel day back to Vegas on Tuesday, I tried my very hardest not to sneeze and cough on anyone. On our first leg from Dallas to Midland, we were able to sit in the front row, which I've never done, and then we moved to an exit row where it was just Robbie and I, so at least I limited my germ spreading, I think. So, sorry for anyone on the Southwest flight back to Vegas on Tuesday if I got you sick.
All in all, our Final Four weekend was nothing short of amazing, and neither of us have any regrets, even though the Badgers lost a heartbreaker! I would do it all over again if I could!
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." -Charles Dickens
