Sister Jean will be in Indy rooting on Loyola Chicago (but picks another team to win it all)
America's most famous 101-year-old college basketball fan will be in Indiana to cheer on her beloved Loyola Chicago Ramblers — but she's going chalk with her pick to win it all.
Sister Jean told NCAA.com's Andy Katz that she picked Gonzaga to win the national championship. She's got Loyola Chicago in the Elite Eight and surely she'd be happy for the Ramblers to prove her wrong and make it to the Final Four. You can watch the complete interview above or in the YouTube clip on this page. Here are some more highlights, including that Sister Jean got her COVID-19 vaccine in January (timestamps in parentheses):
- On her decision to go to Indianapolis (0:30): "Oh, I decided this a long time ago, ever since we've been playing, the guys and I have talked about getting to the Big Dance floor again, especially because Krutwig and Williamson and Aher Uguak were freshmen and played on the team, and besides that, Krutwig is such an outstanding character and such a wonderful player."
- On senior center Cameron Krutwig (0:52): "He's so much fun and he's a good player, he's a great scholar and he takes care of everybody on the team and you can tell when he's playing that he's giving directions, either with his body or by his hand motion or whatever he does, he's taking care of the team."
- On getting vaccinated (1:30): "Oh, I was vaccinated sometime in January and besides that, I've had 30 COVID tests. I just had one the other day, again, so I have all those credentials ready to show."
- On her message to the team (1:55): "The team and I have talked about the Big Dance and oftentimes when they've played a game, I've said, you know, 'The champs probably didn't like that. You have to play like a champ all the time. You have to pretend you're on the dance floor if you want to win the game. You have to keep cool and don't let anybody ever get under your skin, so you can do anything if you just keep calm and keep working.'"
- On how she has been able to help mentor the players during the last year (4:20): "We've zoomed with the team but also I've communicated more with emails this year than anything else, so before every game, they received an email from me and then I sent a prayer with them before the game."
- On how she would compare Loyola Chicago's 2018 team to its 2021 team (5:43): "Well, I have to say when there's that four-year difference, there are different players, naturally, except these fellas who were there when they were freshmen. Porter [Moser] had less time to work with the 2018 team and I think that this team has taken on his culture more than the other team. They bought into Porter, it was like magic. They bought in him right away."
- On her latest bobblehead (8:44): "For the first one, I said, 'Where's the basketball? That's what this is all about.' They made my bobblehead without a basketball. I thought, 'We should get a 20-percent discount for that.'"
