I’ve been a KU basketball fan for most of my life.
For a program with such a great history and tradition of excellence, the expectation is pretty much a top ten finish by the end of the year. And honestly, anything below a final four appearance is a disappointment. And despite all the years of amazing basketball, there can still be only one team left at the end of the year, so championship banners come less frequently than we would hope.
But in 2022, we pulled it off.
While our friends over at KU Athletics handle the vast majority of marketing and promotion related to their various teams, basketball is such a part of KU’s identity that we regularly weave it into our centralized marketing campaigns. And every year we have various communications pieces waiting in the wings, ready to be rolled out if the team happens to make it all the way to the end.
So on April 4, I found myself back in Allen Fieldhouse to watch the championship game with another 10,000 Jayhawks. And sit through one of the worst first halves of KU basketball that I can recall. For a building that sets records for how loud it gets during the regular season, the building was depressingly quiet. But despite trailing 40-25 at the half, KU managed to someway, somehow crawl out of that hole for the greatest NCAA Championship comeback on record.
The entire KU digital media team of photographers and videographers was spread out on Mass St. and at Allen Fieldhouse to photo and film the celebrations. And then I got to edit all of that material into a celebratory video for KU’s social channels that received +150,000 views . It was an incredible privilege to be a part of the official record of this piece of KU history.
What a moment to be a part of.
Photos, drone and edit by Tim Seley
