Inspirational stories keep us coming back

Every sports fan — or at least every one worth his weight in pretzels, peanuts or popcorn — loves rooting for an underdog.

Yes, we love to see the underdog shock the world. We love to see the high-flying favorite get humbled. We love to see that little dude named David knock off that big, bad guy called Goliath.

That's why we loved the movie "Rocky" and the first sequel (but the second, third, fourth or fifth sequels, well, maybe not so much).

That's why we get a lump in our throats when we watch "Hoosiers," "Rudy" or "Remember the Titans."

And, better yet, those are all based on true stories, too.

Ah, yes, the underdog. He's one reason why they play the game in the first place — heck, if we always knew who was going to win, then why bother playing at all? He's one reason why so many of us love sports so much, the chance that some athlete or team might stun the so-called experts and win an improbable championship.

A team like the 1969 New York Jets, who beat the seemingly unbeatable Baltimore Colts in Super Bowl III and helped foster the merger of the two pro football leagues. ... Or a team like North Carolina State, which won the 1983 NCAA men's basketball championship with an upset victory over Houston's heavily favored Phi Slama Jama squad. ... Or the 1980 U.S. Olympic hockey team, which staged its memorable "Miracle on Ice" and won the gold medal by shocking the seemingly invincible Soviet squad on its way to winning the gold medal.

We've seen it on the local sports scene, too: Utah's impressive manhandling of Alabama in the 2009 Sugar Bowl ... BYU winning a national championship in football in 1984 and knocking off top-ranked, defending national champion Miami in 1990 ... Weber State stunning perennial powerhouse North Carolina in the 1999 NCAA Tournament ...

The list goes on and on.

We saw a couple more feel-good sports stories this weekend.

Greg Stimpson, who hadn't played in the Utah Men's State Amateur golf tournament for 22 years, reached the match-play quarterfinals before losing on Saturday.

Stimpson's story is a good one — the 49-year-old former golf pro and collegiate coach regained his amateur status, made it to match play and wound up winning two matches — but it's better by the fact that, in November of 2007, he was diagnosed with leukemia and has been battling the disease since.