Chicago’s nonagenarian sports icons don’t know each other personally, but there’s clearly some respect.
Bears owner Virginia McCaskey, 95, is a huge fan of Loyola-Chicago’s 98-year-old Sister Jean Dolores Schmidt, and has made it a point to alter her schedule to keep up with the college basketball sensation.
Via Rich Campbell of the Chicago Tribune, McCaskey’s son George said his mother changed her dinner plans Sunday at the owners meetings so she could see Loyola’s unlikely advance to the Final Four with a win over Kansas State.
“I said, ‘Mom, dinner is at 5:30,’” George McCaskey said. “And she said, ‘Hmmm, tip off is at 6:09, so I think I’m going to get room service.”
There’s a campus recreation center at Loyola named after George Halas Jr. (Virginia McCaskey’s brother), but Virginia hasn’t met Sister Jean personally.
“Well, Mom is a little shier than Sister Jean is,” George joked. “I think she’d be happy to defer to Sister Jean.”