The Southland Conference Final Makes No Sense

Down in Texas, the Southland Conference is currently wrapping up its conference tournament, with two teams fighting for the right to lose to a 2 or 3 seed. That’s not in and of itself unusual; it’s just that the teams playing, well, defy common logic.

↵The favorites are the regular season champions at Sam Houston State. Now, one would look at the school name and make an educated guess that they’re located in, y’know, Houston. Nope. SHSU is in Huntsville, which is 70 miles outside of Houston. Their team name is the “Bearkats,” which, what? The “bearcat” is already an imaginary animal, and the only school dumb enough to use it as their mascot is Cincinnati, where the academic admittance requirement is “get through high school without committing aggravated assault against your teacher.” Sam Houston State, then, decided to up the ante and spell it the way gas stations and 4-year-olds spell words. That’s a decision we might not have endorsed, if given the opportunity to do so.

↵The, uh, Bearkats’ opponent is Stephen F. Austin University. Located in Austin, right? Not quite--Nacogdoches, which is well over 200 miles away. SFA’s mascot? The Lumberjacks. There aren’t even any trees in Texas!*

↵Having seen this, SBN is starting a college to compete in the Southland called Johnny P. Fortworth State. It’s located in Galveston. JPFSU’s teams will be called the Dawgwalruses, and the mascot will have eight legs and antlers that shoot confetti. We’ll fit right in.

↵

↵*Note: this statement may not be entirely accurate, as everything we ever learned about the state of Texas’ topography came from those tornado chaser videos on YouTube.