of state roads 135 and 46 in Nashville. No one asked was certain where the outhouses came from, but the coach remembered it taking place after more than one game.”

I’ m not quite sure just why abandoning single class basketball let the air out of the balloon, but I feel like it did. I can’ t really picture these spontaneous countywide celebrations recurring today.

I guess that David-and-Goliath idea, the underdog dream, is so deeply rooted in us as Americans, Hoosiers, Brown Countians.

For example, notice the tone of this editorial following Brown County’ s 1972 Sectional win over Columbus North:

“ I would imagine that for those boys, as well as for the rest of us, beating Columbus was as important as winning the sectional …

“ Somehow it has seemed in the past years that no matter how good our team has been and how hard they have tried, they have been destined to lose to Columbus.”

Year after year, you are routinely beaten down by the powers that be, by bigger schools with more players and more resources. But you never give up on the home team.

But deep in his heart, the true fan always hopes, always dreams about that glorious day, that miracle upset, that magical shot, when the tables will be turned and the lowly raised up over the mighty, and for once, if only for one gleaming moment, the underdog will be lifted to sublime, transcendent victory.

This is why the ultimate moment in Indiana basketball history is the“ Mighty Milan” upset of Muncie Central in the 1953 – 54 state championship game. That game became the model for the movie Hoosiers, because it touches on the very heart of the Hoosier Hysteria— that on any given day, in any given game, unforeseen by anyone, the lesser just might prevail over the greater.

It seems like those times are gone. Single class basketball is just a fading memory, abandoned by the Indiana High School Athletic Association in 1996 in favor of the multi-class tournament.

I’ m sure people have found other outlets in which to express their raw passions and most delicate and desirable hopes and dreams. I’ m sure they must find some other way to get their feelings out, something else to shout and scream and get all worked up about.

But we no longer do it together, as a community. •

8 am – 2 pm • Enter from Greasy Creek Rd.

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March / April 2017 • Our Brown County 53