The Olympics are generally a time where the world comes together to bask in the awesomeness of the greatest athletes on the planet. A global event where even the most patriotic among us may find themselves rooting for a foreigner after learning their story. It's beautiful and inspiring — unless the athlete played college sports in the United States.
Then it gets messy. Especially in 2024. You see, college conferences all want one thing: bragging rights.
And they don't care how tangential their conference is to someone's glory if they can claim even a partial percentage. That's only gotten more absurd after the latest round of realignment. Conferences like the Big Ten, Big 12, SEC and ACC are actually claiming medals from athletes who either haven't competed in their conference yet or, in many cases, will never compete in their conference.
It's gone hilariously too far — egregiously so in some of these cases. Tying a course record (62) to clinch GOLD! 😮💨 👤 Scottie Scheffler 🥇 Men's Golf Individual 🏌️ x — Southeastern Conference (@SEC) The No. 1 golfer in the world did not compete in the SEC, no matter how much more it means.
🥇🥇🥇🥇 FOURTH-STRAIGHT GOLD IN THE 800 FREE. x — The ACC (@theACC) Stanford alum Katie Ledecky competed in the Pac 12. The ACC did not make her.
The SEC actually has a better claim, considering she trains at Florida. But the conference certainly does not get to claim just because she used to run at Texas. It doesn't ge.