I began to choke up reading this article that came up as Yahoo's top story this afternoon. It's about an Arkansas high school football star's exemplary sportsmanship at the end of a game against a team mourning the recent death of one of its players.
Thamail Morgan returned the kick-off for what would have been an 80-yard touchdown, but when he was only a couple yards from the end zone, he stopped, backed up to the five-yard line, and took a knee. There were just seconds left in the game and Morgan's team, the Greyhounds, had already ensured victory with the lead, 34-16.
By itself, this is a mature and in Morgan's own words "classy" gesture, but it becomes even more significant because it came from a player who had made bad choices in the past. Morgan transferred to his current high school, Cave City, because he would have been ineligible to play his senior season at Newport because of a rule violation that was not disclosed in this article. Morgan's mistake was serious enough that Division-1 colleges interested in recruiting him stopped calling. Perhaps they should give him another chance.
This story reminds me why I love sports, and sports journalism. You don't even need to be a sports enthusiast for this story to get you in the gut. Morgan's gesture toward the Yellville-Summit team shows how athletics really can bring out the best in us - how pure competition can be when it doesn't involve fame and fortune. Unfortunately sports sometimes bring out the worst, as Serena Williams recently demonstrated during her outburst at the U.S. Open. But at that same tournament, we were inspired by teenager Melanie Oudin. The pros, who seem to have forgotten the fundamentals of sportsmanship, should look to Oudin and Morgan for examples of how to conduct themselves.
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