Has Olympic celebration flamed out in Conn.?
At 5 in the morning in September 1988, I was the internet.
Yes kids (and middle-aged Gen Yers), there was a time when the only information at your fingertips was on old-fangled paper.
I was alone in the Greenwich Time newsroom, taking advantage of a dawn deadline to pack as many results from the Summer Olympics in print as possible. The 14-hour time difference in Seoul meant results were coming in hot in the wee hours, and wire services offered access that was not publicly available. I scribbled layouts on paper and faxed them to the Stamford composing room to put together pages with up-to-the-day results.
The phone rang. Not the scarlet Batphone to the composing room, but the line that collected game scores from coaches and complaints from parents. It usually stopped ringing after 10 p.m.
“Hello, sports.”
“Hi, can you tell me what happened in the men’s doubles match at the Olympics for Rob Seguso and Ken Flach?”
“Umm, sure. They won. Do you mind me asking why ...?”
The caller was Seguso’s former teacher at Cos Cob School. His family moved from 39 Circle Drive to Florida when he was 10, about 15 years earlier, but teachers never forget. Neither did Seguso. He won gold that year, and I later caught up with him when he visited students during a return to Greenwich.
Those kids didn’t care that Seguso left Connecticut before they were born. He had grown up here, and that was enough. I observed similar hometown pride when interviewing other local Olympians, including Connecticut’s gold-medal standard, 1976 figure skating icon Dorothy Hamill.
When Greenwich native Sue Merz returned from Nagano in 1998, she brought the first women’s hockey gold medal to the newsroom for a photo shoot for a special section we produced. I framed a print of the cover to present to her at a Town Hall celebration. It fell apart in my hands during the walk over. I still owe her a frame.
States and hometowns tend to embrace Olympians because they are even more rare then gold. Yet, something seemed to change in 2022.
You may not have noticed, but the Games are over. There have been distractions. Paige Bueckers is returning to the UConn women’s basketball team ... battle lines have been drawn at local schools over mask policies ... war is breaking out 4,700 miles away.
This would seem like a good time to embrace something positive, especially in a state that will never make the medal stand when it comes to selfpromotion. Perhaps Connecticut missed the good news, even though it was reported from NBC Sports studios in Stamford.
Team USA picked up 25 medals (eight gold, 10 silver and seven bronze). Connecticut not only put its fingerprints on several of them, but managed to collect at least one medal in each color scheme, plus a one-of-akind fourth tchotchke.
It claimed other bragging rights as well.
First American to claim a medal in the Games?
That would be Westport’s Julia Marino, who took silver in the women’s snowboard slopestyle.
First gold for Team USA?
That one went to Lindsey Jacobellis, who was born in Danbury and raised in Roxbury. Though she is recognized as the most decorated female snowboard cross athlete in history, Jacobellis came home emptyhanded from three Olympics after winning silver in Turin in 2006. This time, at 36, she also grabbed a second gold medal as a member of the mixed team snowboard cross.
Any Olympic records?
Sure, how about Nathan Chen’s world record in the short program of the men’s figure skating competition, thanks to enough quadruple jumps to make the judges’ heads spin? Chen has the best stats in several categories in his sport, which seems fitting given that he majors in statistics at Yale.
And if you favor the shade of bronze, Madison native Zach Donohue picked one up in the ice dance competition with partner Madison Hubbell (not a typo, his partner has the same name as his hometown).
As for that tchotchke, it came in the figure skating team event featuring Chen and Donahue. The United States finished second, but the doping scandal involving the first-place Russian Olympic Committee put the results in dispute. Team USA members literally (and I loathe using that word) got empty boxes. They were also offered a “holding gift” of torches by International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach.
The torches were used during the Olympic flame relay. It’s unclear if the team accepted the torches, and who knows how long it will take to fill those boxes with silver or gold. I’d grab a torch just to have a one-of-akind memento. Heck, I may start giving torches out as “holding gifts” next time I get invited to a wedding to buy some time.
Six medals with Connecticutions. Six out of 25 for the entire nation. Yes, other states can lay claim to some of the athletes as well, but let’s take the win(s).
To his credit, Roxbury First Selectman Patrick Roy pledged to host a Lindsey Jacobellis Celebration Day if he can lure her from San Diego, Calif. (her parents still have a home in Roxbury).
But how about giving all of Connecticut’s Olympians a shout-out in Hartford? So far, the governor’s office has been pretty quiet. The legislative session is just getting started, so there’s plenty of time to celebrate.
I realize that somewhere in the multiverse is a version of me whining that Gov. Ned Lamont is cheerleading athletes as misdirection from a burgeoning scandal in the state.
But we should make a little noise for these athletes. If you can’t find something to celebrate here, then no medal for you.
Not even a torch.
Six medals with Connecticutions. Six out of 25 for the entire nation. Yes, other states can lay claim to some of the athletes as well, but let’s take the win(s).