I began "Levine on the Scene" with a nervous optimism that I could present the world of Philadelphia sports outside the boundaries of the University.
Over the course of the semester, I learned a lot of things about my adopted hometown and its athletes and fans.
So as I look to the past at the Scenes I have covered and look to the present at the progress each has made, I keep in mind all that I have learned from a championship-starved sports town dying for a winner.
I learned about the Philadelphia fan when I saw the signs pledging undying allegiance to Larry Bowa even after he was axed as the Phillies' manager.
I learned about the Philadelphia athlete when Jujuan Whitsett paid $50 and came out on a chilly fall morning to try out for the hardly glamorous Philadelphia Soul of the Arena Football League.
And I learned about the Philadelphia "athlete" when I watched grown men come in droves to the Gallery at Market East to play video games all day, only to be trumped by a 16-year-old phenom at the Madden Challenge.
But above everything I learned is the fact I always knew: Philadelphia is a football town.
The hype was real
Both Terrell Owens and the Eagles have lived up to every drop of expectation in the September air at the Eagles Kickoff Party at Lincoln Financial Field.
Owens already has a club-record 14 touchdown receptions, and the Birds are comfortably atop the weak NFC. At 11-1, having clinched the NFC East while the calendar still read November, the Eagles have exceeded even this city's high expectations.
But this is a familiar tune to Philly fans; the Eagles have been here before.
Any Eagles fan over three years old knows not to celebrate anything yet, as the Birds have lost three straight NFC championships. Just listen to what Eagles fan Adrian Delfabbro said at the Kickoff Party.
"I suspect they'll do the same as last year," he said. "Hopefully I'm wrong."
Chasing their dreams
The next week, I traveled across the Delaware to Camden, N.J., to review Campbell's Field, a beautiful diamond in the rough of one of America's most downtrodden cities.
On that Sunday afternoon, ballplayers on their way up joined with ballplayers on their way down and ballplayers just plain stuck in the independent Atlantic League to help the Camden Riversharks defeat the Nashua Pride 6-2 in a key game to the playoff race.
The Riversharks would go on to win the South Division and defeat the Atlantic City Surf before being swept by the Long Island Ducks in the Atlantic League Championship Series.
As for former Major Leaguers Chris Widger and Kevin Jordan, they are still on the long road back from the $3,000-per-month Atlantic League to the big show.
Football in Las Vegas?
Get those thumbs ready because the finals are set.
The field of 32 young men from around the country will go for glory and $50,000 in the finals of the Madden Challenge tomorrow in Las Vegas.
Sixteen-year-old Robert "RJ" Warren, who won in Philadelphia, will be there.
And so will Eugene "Big Gene" Williams, one of the favorites in Philadelphia, who captured in Washington that which eluded him that Sunday at the Gallery at Market East.
With dedication like that, it's no surprise that the "Madden culture" is in the height of its golden age.
Down at the track
Todd Pletcher took the easy way out and it paid off to the tune of a million dollars.
New York's top trainer brought his best filly, Ashado, to Philadelphia Park to avoid facing older horses in her final Breeders Cup prep, the Grade 2 Cotillion Handicap.
Four weeks later, I watched Ashado storm down the stretch in the Breeders Cup Distaff to capture the seven figure prize in the same way she toyed with her overmatched competition in Bucks County.
As for the current state of Philadelphia Park, which was captivated by Smarty Jones' 2004 Triple Crown bid, it is once again abuzz at the sight of a colt who evokes memories of a fictional Philadelphia hero.
In this case, "Rocky" is not a boxer, but rather the nickname of two- year-old Rockport Harbor from the same John Servis barn that put Philadelphia Park on the racing map with Smarty Jones.
Rockport Harbor, ridden by Smarty's jockey Stuart Elliot, won his first three starts by a combined 31 3/4 lengths and held on by a neck in the Remsen Stakes at Aqueduct to stay perfect heading into his three-year-old season.
Count on a leg injury to keep "Rocky" sidelined until the Feb. 27 Southwest Stakes at Oaklawn when the colt will begin his real push for the Triple Crown.
Great park, the team ...
When I left Citizens Bank Park after the season finale against the Marlins, I thought it couldn't get much worse for the Phillies and their fans.
After all, the team was picked by many to reach the World Series in its first year at a superb new stadium. Instead, the Phils hovered around .500 all year and had just fired their manager.
Maybe it didn't get worse in two months, but it certainly didn't get much better.
The crisis in center field was "solved" by the addition of Kenny Lofton, who at 37 has seen his stolen base numbers dwindle from 75 in 1994 to seven a decade later. Lofton, the leader in steals among active players, will be wearing his seventh different uniform since 2001.
Lofton will join new manager Charlie Manuel, who managed both Lofton and Phillies slugger Jim Thome in Cleveland.
The Phillies have made no blockbuster moves and just raised regular-season ticket prices in their second season at Citizens Bank Park.
Something tells me playoff ticket prices may not be an issue this year.
Going out in style
The era of women's soccer and of women's sports that began in 1991 ended Thursday night in spectacular fashion.
The Fan Celebration tour, which wound its way through Philadelphia last month, concluded with the United States defeating Mexico 5-0 at the Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif.
The win marks the end of the record-breaking and highly influential careers of Mia Hamm, Julie Foudy and Joy Fawcett, who changed the game and its place in the landscape of American sports.
As was clearly evident in Philadelphia, the trio departs with a very capable supporting cast who will have to step up and lead the team in the absence of the "'91ers."
No NHL, no problem
When Ben Stafford scored to lift the Phantoms to their 10th straight victory, the hottest team in the American Hockey League was just getting started.
The Phantoms would go on to set the AHL record with a 17-game winning streak, breaking the old record of 16 set by the Baltimore Skipjacks in 1985.
And while the streak ended in Syracuse on Nov. 28, it's looking more and more like the 17-game streak is 17 games longer than any streak the Flyers will have this year.
A better tomorrow
One of my scenes just doesn't fit with the rest.
It is a story of progress in a very different sense of the word.
With all that I experienced in my four months of writing Levine on the Scene, there was nothing quite like the day I spent at the Schuylkill River covering the Philadelphia International Dragon Boat Festival.
I was coming off a week of writing about the most average baseball team $93 million could buy when I met the men of Ready, Willing and Able.
These men, trying to recover from a life of homelessness and crime through rehabilitation, sobriety and job training, not only fielded a team for the festival, but also won their first race.
The emotion they showed after the win was more powerful than any I had seen after a Super Bowl, World Series or any championship fight.
It is this kind of story that made the Dragon Boat Festival unique.
Sport has entered the era of numbers, when any detail of any game can be quantified into streaks, stats and formulas.
But at the Dragon Boat Festival, while we did see the times posted at the end of the race, it was a different number that mattered in the end.
The Dragon Boat Festival raised $417,000 for the Fox Chase Cancer Center.
I can't think of a better statistic than that.
