Shawn Blagowsky

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@sportsiren @barryswitzer @OU_Football Awesome!👏🏼

[Oklahoma Baseball @OU_Baseball]

THE OKLAHOMA SOONERS ARE NATIONAL CHAMPIONS 🏆

[Holly Rowe @sportsiren]

When in Florence. @OU_Football
#OUDNA

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@TheJaydenGibson 🙌🏼🙌🏼🙌🏼

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@GabeIkard I live in Dallas and the Luka trade still lives rent free in my head. And not in a good way. 😖😩

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@KellyMRosati 3. We are no longer friends. That exchange could not be overcome. 😔

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@KellyMRosati 1. In early 2020 (after Ahmaud Arbery and maybe before George Floyd) had a close friend want to share something with me about race and BLM. My biracial adopted kids were best friends with her kids. My kids were at her house as much as they were at mine and vice versa. I was happy

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@KellyMRosati 2. To have the conversation until she sent me a video she “wanted me to watch” and comment on. Video with Eric Metaxas interviewing black adopted kids who denied racism. Ugh. Told her this was not my kids’ experience and BLM was important to me. She denied it was a concern.

[Enes Kanter FREEDOM @EnesFreedom]

To my Oklahoma family;
this piece comes straight from the heart.

I hope you’ll take a moment to read it and feel what I felt.
Thank you for allowing me to be a small part of it.

I came to @okcthunder to play basketball. I left carrying 168 lives.

When I was traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder, I was thinking about basketball, nothing more.

I didn’t know that before I ever stepped on the court, this place would show me something that would stay with me far longer than any game.

Like any player, my mind was on the game. A new team, a new city, a new opportunity. I expected the usual routine when I landed in Oklahoma City. Physicals, practices, meetings, and a jersey waiting in a locker.

But before any of that, Sam Presti pulled me aside and told me there was somewhere we needed to go.

He didn’t explain much, and I didn’t think to ask. I was focused on the next step in my career.

What I didn’t understand was that, before I could represent the place I was about to play for, I needed to understand it.

So instead of heading to the facility, he took me to the Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum.

I walked in without knowing what I was about to see, and within minutes, everything slowed down.

There are 168 chairs at the memorial, each one representing a life lost on April 19, 1995. They are arranged in quiet rows, each engraved with a name, each standing where a person once stood in that building. Then you notice something that is impossible to process the first time you see it. Some of the chairs are smaller.

They belong to children.

There is no speech that prepares you for that, no headline that captures it. You simply stand there, and the silence carries a kind of weight that is hard to describe but impossible to ignore.

As you walk through the memorial, you pass between two gates marked 9:01 and 9:03. At first, they seem like simple numbers, but then you understand what they hold. One marks the last minute before the attack. The other marks the first minute after. And in between those two gates is 9:02, the moment when everything changed.

That minute does not feel like history when you are standing there. It feels present.

The reflecting pool stretches across what used to be a city street, its surface calm and still. When you look into it, you do not just see water. You see yourself standing in a place where unimaginable loss occurred, and for a moment, everything else in your life becomes quieter.

Nearby stands the Survivor Tree, an American elm that was damaged in the blast but endured. It is not untouched. Its scars are part of what it represents. But it is still standing, and in that, it carries a kind of strength that does not need to be explained.

We did not speak much while we were inside. It did not feel like a place for conversation. Some places ask for words. This one asks for reflection.

When we stepped outside, Sam Presti looked me in the eye and said, “This is what this state has been through.”

Then he said something I will never forget.

“Every time you step on that court, you are not just playing in front of fans. You are playing for a state that carries this with it. Give them everything you have. They deserve that.”

In that moment, basketball felt different.

Not smaller, but clearer.

Because what I had just seen was not only about what was lost. It was about what remained. A state that had experienced unimaginable pain and still chose to come together, to rebuild, and to move forward without losing its humanity.

From that day on, every time I stepped on the court, I carried that with me.

On the nights when I was tired, when I was hurt, when I was dealing with challenges that felt heavy in the moment, I would think about those chairs, about that minute, about the people behind those names. And I was reminded that what I was going through did not compare to what this state had endured.
https://t.co/XfNLliRVaO

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@AmandaCampau @TheCatLeap When the day started, I thought it was theirs for the taking. As a Sooner, I was more concerned about UF than LSU. It did look like they were underperforming. And I actually hate that for them because they have so much talent.

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@hoopersnook Respect that choice! Iced tea takes priority for sure!

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@hoopersnook As much as I don’t like Texas, I have appreciated seeing Vic Schaefer’s relationship with his players. He doesn’t make it about himself like Geno or White. Nor did he try to draw focus after their loss.

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@MikeLevin I wish the republican leader had had the guts to take that to a vote and force Trump to veto it.

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@ApoloOhno Watching the US women in the biathlon shooting in that position and not missing blew me away.

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

I miss the days when, at least publicly, politicians showed respect and decency to their

[The Bush Archive @TheBushArchive]

George W. Bush’s 2006 State of the Union speech
“There will always be differences and debate. But even tough debates can be conducted in a civil tone.”

[Britt | 🌟 @SlavBritt]

They showed the women’s USA hockey team on the jumbotron in the AAC and a little girl 2 rows in front of me screamed “it’s Hannah Bilka!” And was so excited!
And that’s why women’s sports matter.

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

@hoopersnook Not to mention the fact that someone is asking them the questions and they are just answering. It isn’t like they go around volunteering all of this. Guessing they would be just as pleased to focus on the games. I have been impressed by their restraint as you said!

[Shawn Blagowsky @shawnblag]

I miss having true statesmen like McCain. Class and integrity. Something I miss.

[Alex Taylor @AlexTaylorNews]

"No Madam, he's a decent family man that I just happen to have disagreements with" 👇
John McCain takes the mike away from a racist who "can't trust Obama because he's a, he's a ..."

Throwback to an era (2008) when the Republican Party was led by a Vietnam war hero with values Americans on both sides could be proud of ...
rather than a cult devoted to a 5x deserter, temper-tantrum narcissistic populist mentioned 38K times in the Epstein files and who spends his nights stoking up division by posting (or (allegedly) gets his "staffers" to post) racist garbage

[Alex Taylor @AlexTaylorNews]

"No Madam, he's a decent family man that I just happen to have disagreements with" 👇
John McCain takes the mike away from a racist who "can't trust Obama because he's a, he's a ..."

Throwback to an era (2008) when the Republican Party was led by a Vietnam war hero with values Americans on both sides could be proud of ...
rather than a cult devoted to a 5x deserter, temper-tantrum narcissistic populist mentioned 38K times in the Epstein files and who spends his nights stoking up division by posting (or (allegedly) gets his "staffers" to post) racist garbage

[Ron Filipkowski @RonFilipkowski]

They didn’t delete the meme or blame a staffer because they realized it was racist and the right thing to do.

They didn’t because of public outrage.

They did it because Republican senators FINALLY spoke out and they backed down.

There’s a lesson in that if they will learn it.