Sportsball!

In the Pacific Northwest, we don’t always agree. Yard signs tell one story, bumper stickers another. Coffee orders and which drive-thru stand you prefer can divide a room. But give us a ball, a field, and a jersey, and suddenly strangers are high-fiving like old friends. For a moment, we remember what it feels like to belong not just to ourselves, but to one another.

That is the power of sports in our corner of the country.

In 2025, as the Sounders, Mariners, and Seahawks carried us through an unforgettable year, they reminded us of what still works in a fractured world. Community doesn’t require consensus. It requires common spaces, shared stakes, and the simple act of showing up.

And sometimes all it needs is a chant everyone knows.

The Seattle Sounders have long understood that. Soccer in this region has always been a democratic sport — global but accessible, rooted in local neighborhoods rather than luxury boxes. In 2025, a late-season push carried the Sounders into the playoffs and all the way to the Western Conference final, reigniting the rituals that make matchdays feel like civic events.

Occidental Avenue filled hours before kickoff. Scarves went up. Drums echoed down narrow streets. In the stands, kids stood beside retirees, immigrants beside fourth-generation Northwesterners, and everyone was fluent in the same language for 90 minutes. The Sounders won matches while modeling what an inclusive community can look like when everyone has a seat and a stake.

The 2025 Seattle Mariners reminded us why baseball has long been the heartbeat of the city. For three weeks in October, the team carried fans deep into the play-offs, generating collective joy because the games belonged to everyone. Manager and Mariner legend Dan Wilson put it best: “The electricity here has been incredible, and that’s why you love to do it at home. The fans here deserve that and to celebrate with us. What an incredible evening, an incredible game they were treated to by these guys.”

The Mariners and their fans endured a 15-inning marathon to capture the American League Divisional title. Even from my hotel room in New York City, it was clear this game felt less like entertainment and more like a collective endurance test. The next morning, exhaustion was universal, but so was our pride. That game didn’t belong to just the corporate suites or fans in the Diamond Club. It belonged to everyone who stayed up, hoping and believing a little longer than logic suggested. In a region built on labor and persistence, it felt fitting.

This season, the Seahawks showed what it means to come together as we head into an increasingly complex 2026. As the Super Bowl ended and the Lombardi Trophy was handed to owner Jody Allen, it felt both like a win and a release. Allen had been told to sell the team. Analysts said the Seahawks would finish near the bottom. Instead, the first woman owner to win a Super Bowl stood firm for this team and this city. And the Seahawks delivered. As she hoisted the trophy, cheers echoed from the Key Peninsula to the Cascades. They were ours collectively.

For a brief stretch, life felt a bit lighter. Strangers exchanged knowing smiles in grocery store aisles. Blue and green united people who might never otherwise share a conversation. A Super Bowl win doesn’t solve our problems, but it reminds us that joy isn’t meant to be hoarded. It can be shared. It can spill into the streets.

This is why sports matter. They don’t distract us from real life; they connect us within it. In stadiums, living rooms, and crowded bars, we sit beside people whose lives look nothing like our own. We may have different incomes, cultures, beliefs, and histories, but we are bound by the same fragile hope that this might be the moment everything breaks our way. Sports remain one of the few public experiences where participation isn’t gated by status or determined by agreement.

In the Pacific Northwest, where isolation is often amplified, this kind of community matters. We need spaces where imperfection is allowed, and solidarity is practiced in real time. Sports offer a rare civic commons where people learn, even briefly, how to experience the world together.

Our teams didn’t just give us wins in 2025. They gave us common ground and shared stories we’ll tell for years. Our stories won’t be about just scores and trophies. They’ll also be about who we stood beside when it mattered.

Meredith Browand is a mother and activist who lives in Purdy.