By NICK DILL, student reporter
Trivia night is always at 11 a.m. for Stephen McCluskey, but it’s 5 p.m. for the rest of his family participating in Europe.
A recent event that McCluskey has been doing to connect with his family who live on the other side of the world is a weekly trivia night through Zoom. McCluskey and his family each login onto Zoom every Saturday and answer questions that someone else in the family came up with. Family is important to Stephen McCluskey so he tries to never miss the event.
The topics for the trivia questions vary depending on who is hosting.
McCluskey is a junior tight end for the Northwestern Oklahoma State University Rangers football team, and everything he does is for his family.
He is from Glasgow, Scotland, but was unable to head back home when COVID-19 struck and all classes went online. The virus has caused a travel ban, so his flight back home got canceled.
Despite being stuck in the U.S., McCluskey is still finding ways to connect with his family through this tough time. He does his best to connect with his family through FaceTime and Zoom visits.
Every week McCluskey competes in the family trivia contest from one of his teammate’s homes in Texas. His parents and two brothers sign-in from Scotland, and his sister chimes in from Ireland.
Topics for the contest include general knowledge, music, sports and geography.
“There are five rounds, five questions,” MucCluskey said, reciting the rules for all the participants. “At the end of each round you will send me a picture of your answer to that round. After each round, I will check each team’s answers. I will then tell the answer to everyone, and after that how they scored on the round. After the fifth round, I will have each team’s score for all the rounds, which I will tally up and announce the winners.”
The rounds get intense and arguments erupt about skeptical answers, and whether a team should get a point for that question. Eddy McCluskey, Stephen’s father is always insisting that he should have a better score, even half a point.
“I deserve a point,” Eddy McCluskey demanded. “I named one of the two answers, and I should at least get one point for that. I’m going to leave if I don’t get awarded that point.”
The family gets competitive when they play, but it always ends well, with one family member winning and gaining the bragging rights for the week.
The family members aren’t all about trivia, though, and also spend time chatting back and forth and enjoying their time together during the game. After all, family is everything.