"A Cinderella Story"

[BooCocky]

A Cinderella Story is a story about underdogs, teams that were looked past and prevailed in their respective championship game, or they made a long run in their respective tournament.

A Cinderella Story happens so many but they dont always prevail, for us Americans when we here Cinderella, we think of the 1980 "Miracle on Ice" A team full of Amateurs and Collegiate Athletes, they defeated the Soviets en-route to the gold medal.

The Fresno State Bulldogs were underdogs in the CWS, they had to win their conference tournament just so they can go "dancing". After hard work, solid pitching and defense they won the College World Series after defeating Georgia in a three game series.

The Wildcats of Davidson were another Cinderella Story, led by sophmore Stephen Curry. They played in the Regional Finals and lost but it was a helluva run.

A Cinderella Story pulls in by the heart, following all there movement, everyone wants to know what happened in their game.

Some other Cinderella Stories were the Pittsburgh Steelers of 2005, The Boise State Broncos of 2006, Georgia Southern Eagles of 1985, or even the the Denmark national team in the Euro Tournament 1992.

My favorite Cinderella Story even was following George Mason of 2006 because they were the first "mid major" team to ever advance to the final 4. It was a series of defeating the odds, defeating the so called best, and then a series of heart break. I stayed focused for watching all their games cheering on the underdog hoping they prevailed, and when they did it became exciting and everyone wanted to know how far they'd advance.

Now whats your favorite "Cinderella Story", and why is it your favorite?

 

[klunderbunker]

Mine is one that's not known for much other than the final 2.1 seconds. The 1992 UK Wildcats men's basketball team were a bunch of unknown players that just kicked it into another gear for the tournament, and finally ran into the defending national champion Duke Blue Devils in the 1992 elite 8. Led by Grant Hill, Duke was an unstoppable monster that was supposed to roll to another championship that year. The Cats came out of nowhere and for 40 minutes dueled with Duke and managed to pull off a tie. With 2.1 seconds to go in overtime, Shawn Hayes tied the game up with a jumper, and then came the moment that still to this day makes UK fans cringe. On an absolute miracle, Grant Hill threw a downcourt pass to Christian Laettner who caught it and hit a turnaround jumper that has been shown a million times on ESPN. Those unnameable Cats are now known as the Unforgettables, and rightfully so, at least around here.

 

[RBH]

the 2002 Anaheim Angels!

No one expected them to even make the playoffs! They were coming off a 75-97 season and everyone was jumping on the Ichiro Fucking Suzuki bandwagon! Plus the Yankees were still the assholes of the AL at the time beating the shit out of everyone. Then, the Angels started 6-14 and most Angels fans were prepared for another shitty season. But something happened, the team went on several 8 game winning streaks and never looked back. They finished the season with the wildcard and ended up facing, you guessed it; The New York Yankees in the first round. The Yanks took game 1 leading everyone to believe the Angels were gonna get swept. Then, the Angels did something that no one at the time ever did; WIN AT YANKEE STADIUM! The Angels took Game 2 and then Game 3 and won Game 4 thanks to some help from Tim Salmon. The Angels did the unthinkable; they beat the New York Yankees!

ALCS was awesome and again the Angels lost Game 1 and then went on to win every single game afterwards to win the series 4-1 anchored by Adam Kennedy's 3 Home Run Game 5 effort.

World Series was billed as Angels vs Bonds. The Angels did not dissapoint as they went right at Bonds and lost Game 1 thanks in part to a home run by Bonds. Game 2 and 3 the Angels took and then the Giants took Game 4. Game 5 was worst Angel game in playoff history as Giants took Game 5 16-5 putting the Angels in a corner. The Angels were down 3 games to 2 and losing 4-1 in the 6th inning when the rally started and they won Game 6 in the 8th inning. Game 7 was an easy win and the Anaheim Angels celebrated their first and only world series title.

My second favorite was the Red Sox of 2004 who went on to beat the Yankees 4-3 and then go on to win the world series over the Cardinals in a sweep. Did I mention that they are the only team in history to ever come back from down 3-0. They even clinched the series at Yankee Stadium! Good times!

 

[strafro]

2004 Detroit Pistons!

Everyone saw them as just one of the teams that would lose to Indiana or New Jersey before they went to get crushed by the Lakers.

But in the East semis, the Pistons come out and after losing Game 5in 3OT at home to NJ, they go on the road and win Game 6 , then win 7 at home, what an intense series this was.

They go to the East semis and take on the team that owned them all year, the Indiana Pacers, with the Pistons down 1-0 in the series and with a late lead, Reggie Miller gets a wide open layup, that would either tie or put Pacers ahead, but Tayshaun Prince comes flying out of nowhere with one the greatest blocked shots ever. The Pistons never look back and take the series 4-2 I believe.

Everyone congratulates the Pistons and then says, of by the way you get to face the 2x defending champions LA Lakers. Have fun losing, but the Pistons come out and they don't just beat the Lakers, they embarass them. 4-1. That was truly an epic playoffs for us Detroiters and really no one thought the Pistons would win the NBA championship, not even me! I can just remember the crowd chanting for Darco in Game 5, poor Lakers. This also led to the fallout of Shaq and Kobe.

 

[Frank the Frowner]

Mine is the 2001 New England Patriots.

The 2001 Patriots are without a doubt, the most unlikely team to ever win the Super Bowl. At that point in time, Belichick was still a virtual unknown as far as being a credible head coach was. He had his Cleveland tenure, which was filled with more downs than ups (especially behind the scenes), and one 5-11 season with the Patriots. He was still known as a disciple of Bill Parcells, and many thought that he would never be successful as the coach, especially when Parcells was so animated with the media, and he wasn't.

The first game of the season looked like it would be more of the same. There was a pretty major loss to the Cincinnati Bengals to kick things off, and then the $100 million dollar quarterback, Drew Bledsoe, was injured severely, opening the door for unproven quarterback Tom Brady. The great majority of the rest of the team was filled with veterans of the team, who were around since the days of Bill Parcells and Pete Carroll, and waiver wire castoffs. Tom Brady's first start was the following week against the Colts, and he led the Patriots to a 44-13 win. The Patriots went 11-3 the rest of the way with Brady as the starter, and then they had improbable wins, with the Snow Bowl vs. Oakland, in which the tuck rule was the focal point, and then the AFC Championship game vs. Pittsburgh, where Brady got hurt, and Bledsoe was able to have a last hurrah by leading the Patriots to victory. The Patriots were 14 point underdogs to the Rams at Super Bowl 36, and with 4 seconds left, Adam Vinatieri hit the game winning field goal, giving the Patriots their first Super Bowl win.

That's a true Cinderella team. Nobody thought the Patriots would remotely have a chance at even making the playoffs, nevermind win the Super Bowl.

 

[BooCocky]

if you want to play that game, what about the 2005 Steelers? They had to win their last 4 games just to make the playoffs? They needed to stay afloat while Ben was healing from injuries, they had nobodies at receiver and a past their prime Bus, and an unproven Parker. They had to go into Cinci, a team they saw twice that season already. Then they had to go to Indi and defeat arguably the best team that yr. then they had to go to mile high and beat Denver at the Mile high stadium.

They had an unproven Playoff QB until that season. They had secondary problems and injuries plagued there team all year. Thats a Cinderella Story IMO.