5/4/24 - Weekend Listening from Intercontinental Exchange

Immediately after the New York Giants won Super Bowl XXI on January 25, 1987, an on-field camera from the The Walt Disney Company (NYSE: DIS) caught the victorious Giants’ QB Phil Simms declaring “I’m gonna go to Disney World.”

Making good on his promise, Simms and his family showed up, all smiles, in Orlando the next day. With that, an enduring and beloved campaign began. Kansas City Chiefs QB Patrick Mahomes became the latest victor to utter the famous phrase after his team beat the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LVIII.

A similar tradition has been unfolding in recent years at the New York Stock Exchange. Led by Coach Dawn Staley, the University of South Carolina Gamecocks, winners of the 2024 NCAA Division 1 Women’s Basketball Championship, rang the NYSE Opening Bell on April 16. That appearance was followed in quick succession by Coach Dan Hurley and his University of Connecticut Huskies squad, winners of the Men’s Championship, who rang the Opening Bell on April 21.

Our NYSE TV team covered both visits like a Disney camera crew converges on the quarterback after the Super Bowl’s final whistle. Click here to watch my colleague Judy Khan Shaw in conversation with Carolina’s Coach Staley and tournament Most Outstanding Player Kamilla Cardozo. Click here to watch our own Chris Taylor , a proud U Conn alum, welcome his Huskies to our Board Room.

For our Inside the ICE House episode this week, we turned the questioner’s mic over to our colleague Lance Glinn, M.A. , a college hoops savant, to grill Hurley on whether the Huskies can “three-peat” in 2025. The last time a team demonstrated such dominance was the legendary run of the UCLA Bruins under Coach John Wooden from 1967 to 1973.

Catch Lance’s unfiltered conversation with Dan while you’re waiting for this afternoon’s 6:57 ET Post Time at Churchill Downs for the 150th running of the Kentucky Derby. Between mint juleps, come for Dan’s recipe to rebuild his roster, but stay for his unvarnished views on the many off-court challenges the college game is facing.

“We run the single best sporting event in the United States every year,” Dan told Lance. “We just do things to hurt our sport, whether it's G League Ignite, or Overtime Elite or the Portal opening the week of the NCAA Tournament. We just do things actively to make our sport worse, and then we also market it as badly as any sport.”

The view from Storrs:

• Husky Dominance: UConn HC Dan Hurley on His Back-to-Back National Championships Over the past six years, UConn Men's Basketball Head Coach Dan Hurley has revitalized Storrs, Connecticut, re-establishing it as the college basketball capital of the world. Now, with back-to-back NCAA Championships under their belt, UConn is poised to pursue a rare three-peat next season, a feat not seen since John Wooden and UCLA's seven-peat in the 1970s. Coach Hurley, fresh off a national title and an NYSE bell-ringing, goes Inside the ICE House to delve into the Huskies' dominance, his coaching journey, and the exciting prospects for the upcoming 2024-2025 season.

If you’re on a smart phone, all of our Inside the ICE House podcast episodes are available wherever you get your podcasts, including the Apple Podcast App, Spotify, and Stitcher, and other audio platforms. Feel free to reach out to me with any feedback about our show, or suggest any guests for future episodes.