Mar 23, 2020 3 min read

It didn’t take long until the question was asked for the first time.

It was, in fact, uttered moments after the PIAA put its basketball and swimming championships in a holding pattern for at least two weeks and its spring seasons in limbo. It was asked after the NBA shut down its season, leading to every pro sports league from the NHL to the World Tiddlywinks Association to follow suit. It was asked after the NCAA canceled its basketball tournament. And it was asked after The Masters and Kentucky Derby were postponed.

“What do you put in the sports section of the newspaper if there are no sports being played?”

It has been more than a week since the sports landscape went dark as play has been suspended because of the coronavirus pandemic. When the sports world we knew makes its return is anybody’s guess.

However, just because there aren’t games being played doesn’t mean there aren’t important stories to tell. A team can win or it can lose, but what’s fascinating are the personalities involved in sports. The triumph of someone overcoming odds, or the tragedy of how an injury changes an athlete’s life, are interesting. These are the kinds of stories that make sports unique, and these are the stories we’ll continue to tell, regardless of whether games are played.

But, if you are like me, then one of things you like most about newspapers is picking it up in the morning and reading about who won, who lost and why.

I still love going to the games. I still walk into the ballpark, the football stadium or gymnasium sure I’m going to see something that night I’ve never seen before. It is that hope that keeps me going back.

That has been missing from our daily routine for almost two weeks.

And it’s why the O-R sports staff has decided to keep the games stories going. There have been plenty of memorable games – or matches, if you prefer wrestling – over the years that have involved people or teams from the O-R‘s

coverage area. They were competitions that had us talking at school, around the office water cooler, at the local diner or in the bleachers about what happened and why.

Some of those stories were about triumph, some involved controversy, some brought heartbreak and frustration. And they are all in the O-R archives, which dates back to the days of the Washington Observer and the Washington Reporter.

Over the next few weeks, or until the sports world we love returns to normal, the O-R will run one game story from the archives in a section called “When Sports Were Played.” The first one is included in this edition and it recounts a game that dominated the O-R’s sports section exactly 34 years ago today – Washington’s victory over Wilkes-Barre G.A.R. in the Class AA boys basketball state championship. It concluded a remarkable three-year run that saw Wash High win 81 of 83 games including a WPIAL-record 52 straight.

If there are any memorable games you’d like us to revisit, send an email and tell us the particulars, such as who, what and which year it happened.