My dad nearly has a stroke every time he watches a Miami University RedHawks men’s basketball game. And trust me, I’m not being dramatic. This is a man who becomes physically unwell when the RedHawks’ lead drops below 10 points. He paces, yells and performs what can only be described as an interpretive stress dance in our living room. It’s quite the spectacle.
To be fair, he comes by it honestly. He graduated from Miami in 2001 and was roommates with Rich Allendorf, who was on the 1999 Sweet Sixteen team led by Wally Szczerbiak.
If you’ve ever met someone who thinks their alma mater peaked athletically the year they were in college, you can imagine the energy. To this day, my dad treats every Miami game like it’s March Madness and he’s somehow both the coach and the sixth man off the bench.
This season has only made him more unbearable. According to CBS Sports’ coverage of its “nail-biter” against Western Michigan, Miami escaped with a 69-67 win that I’m pretty sure shaved years off my father’s life.
Meanwhile, the official schedule on the Miami athletics site reads like a curated museum exhibit titled, “Teams we’ve beaten, sometimes dramatically, sometimes by accident.” With its record sitting at 29-0, it is just two games away from a perfect season, something my dad mentions approximately 12 times a day.
But here’s where things get fun: Ohio University has the chance to end it. To shatter it, to forever stain Miami’s undefeated dream with one beautifully inconvenient loss.
The rivalry between Ohio and Miami is not subtle, nor is it polite or quiet. It’s a decades-long tug-of-war over bragging rights, pride and which school’s fans are more insufferable, and this year, the Bobcats have the tools to do it. Their stats show an offense that’s finally starting to look dangerous.
Miami enters its last game of the season against Ohio, probably undefeated, the cameras lingering on it like it’s the inevitable hero of the season. My dad will be planted in the audience, already stressed before the tip even happens. Hopefully, Ohio will walk onto the court with the one job rivals have perfected over generations, stepping in at the exact right moment and ruining everything Miami has going for it.
There’s something profoundly satisfying about the idea. Not because Miami doesn’t deserve success, but because no perfect season should survive a rivalry game in the Mid-American Conference. That’s not how college basketball works; something always goes wrong. A bad shooting night, a hostile crowd, one player who decides it’s his moment. If anyone can deliver that plot twist, it’s Ohio.
The funniest part is knowing exactly how my dad will react if it happens. He’ll sit in The Convo, stunned into betrayed silence, staring at the court like the scoreboard personally wronged him. He’ll pull out his phone and check the numbers even though they aren’t going to magically reverse themselves. He’ll mutter something about “terrible officiating” or “just an off night.” And even though I won’t be there in person, my brother and I, who are proud OU students, will make absolutely sure he never lives it down.
So please, for the sake of every Bobcat who has ever had to sit through a Miami fan talking about “tradition” or “culture” or the 1999 Sweet Sixteen run like it happened yesterday, and for the sake of my own sanity, I am begging the Ohio men’s basketball team to pull this off.
End the perfect season and make my dad’s three-hour drive back from Athens just a little quieter. Do it for the rivalry, do it for the MAC and do it for all of us who know that nothing, absolutely nothing, tastes sweeter than Miami losing to Ohio.
Abby Waechter is a senior studying strategic communication at Ohio University. Please note the views and opinions of the columnists do not reflect those of The Post. Have something to say? Email Abby at aw087421@ohio.edu.
