An eventful day winding down

Well since my last post I think I have had about a half hour of down time. We have been all over the place today going from team practice to our community engagement event, to the Elite Eight coaches press conference, to the Alamo for a team picture, and finally to the team banquet.

You've heard about our practice session and the venue where the games will be played in my last blog post. The community engagement event, which every team is required to participate in at the Elite Eight, was most likely the highlight of our trip up to this point. We went to Carroll Bell Elementary School in San Antonio where we met 100 students who were beyond excited to have our team at their school. The event started with our team running into a gymnasium to loud music and cheers from the students. Coach Krauth opened the event with a great message to the students at Carroll Bell Elementary. He expressed the importance using all of their abilities and having dreams to do big things in life. Coach expressed the importance of education to the students and said that they too, if they work hard at everything they do in life, they too can be successful in anything they want to. After coach Krauth's message, each player introduced themselves and told the students where they were from.

Coach Krauth giving a message to the students at Carroll Bell Elementary.

Students at Carroll Bell Elementary prepared a dance to pump up the Vikings.

The students also had a gift for each of our players, a t-shirt with their school's name and mascot on the front. The Vikings brought Augustana t-shirts with them and handed them out to the students for answering trivia questions about the team. Below is a picture of the t-shirts our team received.

At the conclusion of the community engagement event, the Vikings performed an impromptu performance of the Cupid Shuffle with the students. Below is a video clip of that.



Each team in the tournament then went to the Alamo where they had a team picture taken. I apologize for not getting a picture of our team in front of the Alamo for this post, but I had a handful of player's cameras taking pictures and wasn't able to juggle my cell phone into the mix. But here is a picture of the Alamo itself.

With that, I will leave you with the fact that tomorrow is GAMEDAY!!!

The Vikings will hit the floor at noon tomorrow against Clayton State. If you will be here tomorrow, I am looking forward to seeing all the blue and gold in the stands and will see you here. If not, thank you for your support and enjoy cheering on the Vikings from wherever it is you are. Here is a link that has all the information you need to view the game from home tomorrow, click HERE. Also on that page is information for the viewing party that will be held at Buffalo Wild Wings and on campus at the Back Alley.

Thanks again for checking in and Go Vikings!