OUR VIEW: Indianapolis scores a TD

Seems as though wherever you look in the national media and local news sites around the country, Indianapolis and the Hoosier state scored well last week as Super Bowl XLVI came to town.

Journalists, pundits and others touted our capital city as being worthy of joining Miami and New Orleans as regular hosts of the big event. Mixing metaphors, some sports writers and broadcasters opined that Indianapolis hit a home run and others talked about the city knocking it out of the park.

Our Hoosier hospitality shined brighter than ever. Pundits sang the praises of a cadre of more than 1,000 volunteers who gave their time to make the Super Bowl experience a treasured memory.

Even fellow Hoosiers such as John Nolting of Brownstown and Seymour businessman Jim Richardson commented on the corps of volunteers manning the Super Bowl Village and NFL Experience during their family visits.

“They were very, very hospitable,” Nolting said in a Jan. 30 story in The Tribune. “As you were walking, volunteers would stop you and ask if there was anything they could do to be of help. Indianapolis is really being well represented.”

Records were broken, according to the Super Bowl host committee: 1.1 million people visited Super Bowl Village and more than 265,000 packed the Indiana Convention Center. That’s where fans could buy a bit of everything and where groups such as volunteers from St. Ambrose Catholic School in Seymour worked, helping sell merchandise for vendors and raising money for playground equipment.

And other Hoosier cities got in on the act as well, with Bloomington, Columbus and others serving as Super Bowl Super Celebration Sites in a ring around Marion County. Those sites offered Super Bowl-related activities that also highlighted their local communities.

Hoosiers should be proud. We again showed the world we’re capable of playing on a national and international stage.

What do you think?

What’s your opinion on this topic? Send your comments to ddavis@tribtown.com. You can find copies of earlier editorials online at TribTown.com.