Promising Fargas suffers season-ending upset of the cruelest kind

mark snyder

Tears fell from their eyes. With their seasons over, Michigan basketball players Louis Bullock and Raina Goodlow were the picture of disappointment.

Goodlow was experiencing the end of her freshman season as a member of Michigan's women's basketball team. The frustration came moments after her team was stunned by Michigan State in the women's National Invitational Tournament.

The end came suddenly, on a putback basket by Michigan State's Becky Cummings that snuffed the hopes of a continued season.

Goodlow knew nothing of a grueling season's end, where she would go the next day when there was no practice or how long the disappointment would linger. All she knew was she'd have another chance.

In fact, she'd have three more years to end her season with a victory. After a heartbreaker to end the playoff campaign, there would be redemption one day.

But at that moment, as she crouched over a table inside Crisler Arena, she felt as low as low could go. Bullock knew the feeling well. His version of the Wolverines had lost all season long - an unusual occurrence for the sweet shooter from Maryland.

He came to Michigan to win championships, yet the team had hit a brick wall time and time again, overmatched in size and strength. His college basketball career ended on a gloomy Chicago day.

His team played like the weather, cold and wet, as if this season could have washed away with the cleansing rain pounding the streets outside the United Center.

Bullock was an integral component of the previous season's Big Ten tournament championship and had played three NCAA tournament games.

But this was not a hero's end. Not before the postseason had even begun.

The disappointment of an upset is natural in sports. It's actually much of the intrigue.

But when the home team loses or an event doesn't turn out as planned, the term 'upset' assumes a whole new meaning.

On this morning, just five days after witnessing grand larceny before his eyes, professional boxer Lennox Lewis knows the meaning of being upset.

He's upset at the two judges who robbed him of ultimate glory - one scored his bout with Evander Holyfield a draw while the other gave the obviously-defeated Holyfield a victory.

He's upset that he was robbed of the dignity of his sport where a man can clearly win a fight in front of millions on television, but judges on three sides of the ring can witness something different.

Professional prizefighting - as it is loosely suggested - has assumed some upset potential of its own this week. Fans from all side have derided the sport and the fight as a predetermined outcome (a fix as it is called in boxing circles).

Sports columnists who attend maybe one fight a year and have little authority to judge technical skill slammed the event for sinking below the depths it had already assumed.

But one man has been fighting back all week.

University of Michigan alum and boxing historian Bert Sugar is fighting a losing battle. I heard him on three radio shows and saw one television program this week where he stated his case that boxing is still legitimate. (He also told the same jokes on each, like, "In the fourth round, I was so bored I hoped a hockey game would break out," but we'll let him slide on that.)

Sugar knows as much about boxing upsets as anyone - having covered boxing intently for the past 40 years - and he contends that the fight was a lot closer than the faulty computer scoring indicated.

'Upset' carries a whole different meaning for the Michigan football team and one individual in particular. Just a week before spring practice was to begin (the closed-to-the-public-and-media, nobody-inside-the-fortress spectacle starts Saturday), coach Lloyd Carr let slip that soon-to-be sophomore tailback Justin Fargas would not be playing this spring or this fall.

His broken leg didn't heal correctly and he had additional surgery, slowing the fastest legs on the team for a whole year.

How much longer after that?

Nobody knows.

For his sake and quality of life, here's hoping Fargas comes back strong as ever, whenever that is - even if it's nowhere near a football field.

Carr has always remained loyal to his injured players. After safety Daydrion Taylor gave his career for a bone-crushing tackle against Penn State in 1997, he remained with the team and helped out at practices.

But for an athlete used to prime condition and prime attention, sometimes what's missing is more difficult than what's there.

Odds are, there'll be a spot for Fargas in Michigan's classrooms for as long as he wants to stay. But how long that will be remains a mystery.

Losing the ability to do what you're best at. That's what can cause the greatest upset.

And I'm sure Fargas would trade places with Goodlow, Bullock or Lewis in moment.

They each lost a single contest. For now, he's lost the ability to play a game.

- Mark Snyder can be reached via email at msnyder@umich.edu.

03-18-99