SARAH FULLER
While professional sports may have come to a crashing halt for much of this year with seasons cut short in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic, there were still so many epic sport achievements in 2020. Women showed the boys how to play like a girl, opposing players rallied together against social injustice, and every athlete demonstrated what sports are really all about… the triumph of the human spirit against all odds. These are our picks for the top 10 sport performances of the year, and our 2020 STYLE of SPORT Champions!
Sarah Fuller plays like a girl…
#LetsMakeHistory… she said and she did! On December 12th, Sarah Fuller became the first woman to score in an NCAA Football Power Five conference game — which includes the SEC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12, and ACC — with a kick in the 4th quarter delivered squarely through the uprights. With the remainder of the season canceled due to Covid-19, it was not before her history making achievement.
Maya Gabeira surfs the biggest wave of the year…
On February 11th, Maya Gabeira set a new world record by surfing the largest wave of the year — a behemoth at 73.5 feet, in Nazaré, Portugal — beating the boys to win the World Surfing League’s 2020 XXL Biggest Wave Award. See here. It was the largest wave ever surfed by a woman. Even more impressive is that she had nearly drowned in the same spot back in 2013, when she wiped out on a 70-footer, bouncing down the wave’s face, getting so pummeled by the surf it ripped off her life jacket. Gabeira was rescued by her jetski riding partner Carlos Burle, who pulled her to shore, administered CPR, and saved her life — all of which was caught on video that went viral around the world. Talk about getting back on the horse… or the board!
The NBA shows how much Black Lives Matter…
The NBA was the first professional sports league to suspend their season amid the Coronavirus outbreak. The league resumed play on July 30th, with all teams housed and games played in the “bubble” of the ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex in Florida. In the wake of the killing of George Floyd and nationwide protests, the NBA made social justice central to its restart with messages on jerseys and “BLACK LIVES MATTER” painted on the court. Players were allowed to kneel during the national anthem despite a longstanding rule requiring them to stand. But when yet another black man, Jacob Blake, was killed in a police shooting on August 23rd, the players refused to take the court in protest, sitting out primetime playoff games. When the season did resume, it was only with a deal to convert league-controlled arenas into polling stations, and the creation of a social justice coalition comprised of players, coaches, and team owners to focus on issues like voter turnout, civic engagement, and policing reform.
A 19-year old unseeded player becomes the 2020 French Open champion…
In another sport upended by the pandemic, 3 of the 4 tennis Grand Slams were either cancelled (Wimbledon) or rescheduled (US Open and French Open). When the latter was played in a chilly October in Paris, as opposed to the usual steamy June, 19-year old unseeded and relatively unknown Iga Świątek triumphed in the final. She defeated 2020 Australian Open champ Sofia Kenin 6–4, 6–1 to win her first Grand Slam tournament. Świątek is also the first Polish player to win a Grand Slam singles title.
They escaped fiery crashes…
In both NASCAR and Formula 1 car racing, fiery crashes spared the lives of race car drivers Ryan Newman (above) and Romian Grosjean (below). The first came on February 17th in the final lap of the Daytona 500. Ryan Newman was in the lead when a crash sent his car airborne, flipping several times, before landing as flames erupted. Pulled from the wreck, the 42-year old driver was hospitalized and placed in a medically induced coma. It was what he called “big miracles and little miracles” that allowed him to walk out of the hospital two days later, holding his young daughters’ hands, and return to racing just 3 months later.
On November 29th, Haas F1 driver Romain Grosjean was also involved in a terrifying accident, his coming on the first lap of the Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix when his car plowed into the barriers, was ripped in half, and burst into flames. Miraculously, the French driver was able to get out of his car and hop over a safety barrier away from the wreckage, escaping with just some burns on his hands and bruising.
Bryson DeChambeau had a big year…
Bryson DeChambeau changed golf this year with his revolutionary approach to the game. In 2020, he turned the full force of his obsessive work ethic to the quest of massively increasing his driving distance by transforming his body, putting on 40 pounds of muscle in the off season. When play resumed after the three-month coronavirus hiatus, DeChambeau’s game had become one of pure power, bashing his way to victory by hitting the ball as far as possible without worrying whether it landed on the green or not. Though his approach was considered controversial by puritans of the sport, he managed to win the delayed US Open at Winged Foot in September, on one of the game’s most punishing and narrow courses, and quiet the naysayers with the only sub-par score of the tournament.
Kim Ng is the first female general manager in MLB history…
On November 13th, the Miami Marlins named Kim Ng as their general manager, making her the first woman to become a general manager not just in Major League Baseball, but in any of the major men’s leagues in North America. The news was delivered to her by Derek Jeter, chief executive and a part owner of the Marlins, who 20 years earlier had presented Ng with the Women in Sports and Events award for her pioneering work with the Yankees, when both he played and she worked for the team. After three decades in the MLB, first as an assistant general manager for the Dodgers and the Yankees, and most recently as MLB’s senior vice president for baseball operations, Ng was long viewed as the woman most likely to break this gender barrier. She admitted to feeling deflated over the years after interviewing for several general manager openings and not getting any jobs. As reported in The New York Times, Ng said she felt a “10,000-pound” weight lifted off one shoulder only to be switched to the other. “I know that I am quite visible,” she said, adding later, “You’re bearing a torch for so many.”
Alenka Artnik breaks the Freediving world record with 374 foot descent…
On November 8th, Slovenian Alenka Artnik plunged 114 meters (374 feet) into the Red Sea off Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, without the aid of breathing apparatus, and surfaced 3 minutes 41 seconds later with the women’s world record in Freediving. Watch here. In the life threatening conditions that come with the sport, Artnik descended gracefully with the aid of a monofin as the barometric pressure increased every 10 meters, compressing her lungs to a third of their normal capacity, and slowing her pulse to half her resting rate, as her body adapted to use the oxygen in her bloodstream more efficiently. At 70 meters she sank like a rock, which is what happens at around that depth, and she surrendered to the free fall. Displaying that same calm when she surfaced, she paused a few seconds… before she and her support team finally erupted in cheers!
Texas School for the Deaf football team is the best in state…
Friday night lights shown bright on the Texas School for the Deaf when this high school football team beat their crosstown rivals, undefeated Veritas Academy of Austin, 63-32 to win their first Texas State Championship on December 12th. Profiled on the The Today Show, the team overcame not just challenges faced by players and coaches who are all deaf or hard of hearing, but a season that was nearly cancelled and one in which everything changed. Because of the pandemic, Texas School for the Deaf decided to switch divisions from the traditional 11-player football league to the 6-player league, where the field is shortened from 100 yards to 80 yards. Demonstrating their ability to adapt quickly to the smaller field and wide-open style of play, they proved nothing could beat this team this year.
Tara VanDerveer becomes the winningest Head Coach…
With a win against Pacific on December 15th, Stanford Women’s Basketball head coach, Tara VanDerveer, passed the late great Pat Summitt to become the winningest head coach in D1 women’s college basketball history with victory number 1099. But this is just as much an homage to the legendary Summitt, head coach of the University of Tennessee Lady Vols basketball team from 1974 to 2012, as it is to VanDerveer who acknowledged her after the win. These two head coaches had competed against each other 29 times, with Summitt winning 22 of those matchups. VanDerveer called Summitt, who retired in 2012 following a diagnosis of early onset Alzheimer’s, “the gold standard, the icon.”
