Hey Seattle--Enough With the Whining!

Just when the whining out of Seattle regarding the officiating in the Super Bowl was starting to quiet down, columnist Art Thiel stirred up another round in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer this morning.

Thamel had these comments referring to the University of Washington's overtime loss Friday night to Connecticut in the Sweet 16:

Northwest sports-conspiracy theorists, if you still have your ticket from the line after the Super Bowl, please take your place in the usual and accustomed positions.

That would be:

Bent over.

Again, another Seattle team on the national stage took a hosing from execrable officiating.
Again, a big game was lost to a higher-profile team that the powers would prefer advance.

I don't know Art, but I've got two words of unsolicited advice for him regarding his conspiracy theory thoughts--shut up.

I did not see enough of the game to offer an opinion regarding the officiating, and certainly not toward any issue of bias. The most critical call, a technical foul on Washington's Brandon Roy that sent him to the bench with 13 minutes left, was even disputed by UConn's coach Jim Calhoun, a classy thing for him to do.

Speaking of class, Washington coach Lorenzo Romar took the high road after the game, saying "You're going to get calls, you're not going to get calls," he said. "That's part of the game."

Nice job coach. Even Thiel admitted that, despite the calls that when against Washington, they still had plenty of opportunity to win the game. He concluded, however, by returning to the low road:

Unfortunately for the (W)Huskies, there is no reward for gallantry, no bracket advance for playing well beyond one's talents. Just as there is no alternative for justice denied.

Ask the Seahawks. Sometimes better isn't enough.

Hopefully his readers will follow the example of Coach Romar and not a writer who was up well past his bedtime when he wrote this column.