As the annual Big Dance took students, athletes, and fans alike across the nation for the first weekend’s match ups, it also took Americans by surprise to see so many star players openly profess their faith in post-game interviews. And while the traditional buzzer beaters and last-second heroics are always the most captivating, what has stood out to many fans is the number of players humbling themselves before, and giving credit to, God for their opportunities.
The Christian Tribune has twice reported this week on the post-game interviews with Alabama’s Sarah Ashlee Barker and Texas Christian University’s Hailey Van Lith, who each spoke about how faith grounded them in moments of both trial and triumph. All told, it is a welcome addition to a sports world all-too-often inundated with egos and focused on highlight reels.
The positive trend of hearing student-athletes praise their Lord and Savior, while embraced by casual and serious fans alike, is welcome but not wholly new. Last year, the University of Connecticut’s Paige Bueckers spoke with ESPN shortly after a monstrous performance led her team to yet another Final Four for the storied women’s basketball program.
During that interview, a clearly emotional Bueckers said she gives “all the glory to God.” And like the other young women Barker and Van Lith, it was the first thing she said when asked what was going through her mind after her team sealed its victory. “I’m a living testimony. I give all glory to God. He works in mysterious ways. Last year, I was praying to be back at this stage, and he sent me trials and tribulations. But it was, it was it was to build my character, it was to test my faith, to see if I was only believer,” she said.
She added: “I did all I could so God can do all I can, and just so much joy and pride for this team. I’m so proud. We’re not even supposed to be here, and here we are, a Godly miracle. I’m just so proud. I can’t even put it in words…you can, you can overcome anything with God on your side, with hard work on your side, with the belief and the faith and just the perseverance, the resilience.”
Take a look at the interview from 2024’s women’s tournament where Paige Bueckers gave credit for her team’s return to the Final Four to God below:
Buecker’s 2024 comments preceded what has become two of the biggest recent stories at The Christian Tribune. Previously, it covered Barker recounting her trip to the free throw line down three and getting three shots after being fouled from behind the arc. Preparing to take her shots, she remembered thinking that make or miss, God would always “be her rock.”
“The Lord….is who I look to for my strength, my peace. He upholds me. On my wrist, I write Isaiah 4:-10 and it says, I will strengthen you. I will help you, and I will uphold you. And regardless if I would have made all three, or not all three, He would have still been my rock, and he still would have held me, held my head high, and I knew that, and that’s what Carly’s word said during my prayers,” Barker said.
Van Lith echoed similar sentiments of gratitude and strength emanating from her faith. In fact, she said the exact same thing as Bueckers did a year ealier, saying her accomplishments were “all glory to God.” “It’s a blessing. But I really am, I’m really standing on God’s shoulders right now. You guys ,He’s delivered me from so much man and so much pain and suffering and confusion, and I just it’s all glory to God,” she said. “And you know it’s, it’s God working, man.”
Featured image: Screen shot from embedded video