Neighborhood Yard

The Gows’ yard is the ultimate destination for a pickup basketball game. From left: Lawson, Christopher, Wesley, parents Audrey and David, David Jr. and Sarah. Golden retriever Clark is the family’s resident escape artist. (Photo: hartphoto.com)

Thump. Thump. Slow and deliberate like a drumbeat, the cadence echoes down leafy Sunset Boulevard in West University Place. Ears harken to the familiar sound, that of the bouncing ball and the whoosh as it meets net. Springy young legs hustle down the sidewalk to get in on the action. They know just where to go.

It’s Game On at the Gow house.

“Yeah, follow the sound of the bouncing ball. That’s sometimes how it starts. We’ve had tons of people here over the years, even 2 year olds with neighbors. Even grandpas,” says Audrey Gow, who has raised five yard-sport-addicted kids with husband David.

Their lot is sports central, with a large grassy area for football, a full-size gymnast trampoline and an all-weather basketball court that lures game-trolling friends and neighbors like moths to the proverbial flame.

“The yard, the house, the big family, these are the best parts of being a Gow. The Gow house is my happy place, and there are many out there without the last name Gow that I know would say the same,” says Rice graduate Lawson Gow, 26, who works for a global venture capital group. He is the eldest of siblings David Jr., 24, Christopher, 22, Sarah, 19, and Wesley, 14.

Wesley, a freshman at St. John’s School, plays junior varsity football. Sarah studies psychology and sports administration at Pepperdine University and studies abroad this year in Buenos Aires. Christopher double majors in religion and math at Amherst College in Massachusetts and is captain of its football team with an undefeated 2014 record. David Jr. studies acting at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

It’s a busy, talented bunch, this lot. But they’re always ready for a little fun when home.

Yard sports provide bonding time, Lawson says, and their mom’s hospitality and cooking were the ingredients for a constant flow of amateur enthusiasts over the years.

Ahh shucks, says Audrey, modest to the core. She sees their sports court as a blessing to share with others. “Every bit from God.”

Dad David is the lifeblood behind this family tradition. As a youth in Houston, he played all manner of games in a neighbor’s yard, reveling in the competition and camaraderie.

“We played tag, capture the flag, dodgeball, all sorts of things nearly every day of the week,” David says. “That kind of set a precedent. Once we had that lot next door, there were certain intentions. There was certainly an instinct to enable the neighborhood to come on over and play.”

His company, Gow Media, owns two Houston sports-talk radio shows, ESPN 97.5 FM and Yahoo Sports Radio 1560 AM. In partnership with Yahoo Sports, the company creates radio shows syndicated to stations across the country. David also is the announcer for St. John’s School varsity football games.

Whether by genes or influence, his kids caught his sports bug.

“Yeah, probably a good thing to have all that touch football under my belt,” says Christopher, who played for St. John’s School before Amherst College. “When we didn’t have enough people over for a game, trees would serve as receivers, so if you could hit a tree it would serve as a completion. When you played defense, you tried to stand in front of them and knock the ball down.”

David Jr. recalls “the tree game” too. “Any sport that you can possibly play on a front yard we have played, and those might even be outnumbered by the number of games we invented,” he says, calling their yard-sport obsession an “icebreaker” with strangers. “Neighbors from three blocks down would trickle in when they caught wind of a game being played.”

Sarah, who competed statewide in gymnastics for several years, has fond memories of perfecting her routines on the trampoline. The apparatus was affectionately coined the “Sunset Tramp” by those who knew of its locale on Sunset Boulevard.

“The Gows are kind of a West University legend, aren’t they?” quips family friend John McCarthy, 25, of his “surrogate family.” Now a medical student at the University of Virginia, he figures he owes thousands in food reimbursement. “Oh my gosh, all the meals! And Mr. Gow? Man, that guy is amazing with his running color commentary when you play at their place. Made you feel like you were on TV or something.”

Yes, the Gows like to keep it fun. In addition to their dad’s booming, real-time play-by-plays, he would assign participants a professional sports star’s name for the duration of play. “But my dad decided that whenever my mom would play, she deserved the most female name possible, so her athlete name for every sport became Petina Effeminate,” recalls Lawson.

“We’ve had a lot of fun here. It basically became like the neighborhood park,” says Wesley, who has done his fair share of ball retrievals from the neighbor’s yard.

There have been other kinds of retrievals as well. Clark, the family’s golden retriever named for Superman’s character, has athletic powers of his own — the ability to escape said yard.

“So yeah, we retrieve Clark,” says Audrey. “He’s an escape artist. That’s his sport.”