Janet and Ernie Knobloch could not believe their eyes when the Chicago Cubs finally broke their 108-year losing streak and won the World Series.
Sitting at their “lucky table” at Kaiser’s Pizza and Pub in Gurnee, the Oak Creek, Wisconsin, couple cheered and hugged each other as patrons around them erupted into cheers that drowned any other sound inside the bar.
With tears in her eyes, Janet clutched her chest and said, “It’s like a dream right now, except … I’m not getting any sleep tonight.”
A Cubs fan for almost 60 years, Ernie said he predicted the night’s win.
This season they traveled to Arizona for spring training, then to California for the opening game; back to Arizona and then Chicago.
“We were at the four openings because I had a feeling this was the year,” Ernie said.
The couple has been to 89 Cubs games in their lifetime. Before Wednesday night the Knoblochs said they were die-hard frustrated Cubs fans.
Now the curse is broken, they said.
“I thought I was going to die before my team won a World Series,” Ernie said. “We’re feeling sky-high.”
The couple said they plan on attending the celebratory parade in Chicago.
There was a conga line, dancing on top of the bar and champagne sprayed everywhere after the Cubs won.
For hours patrons had been at the edge of their seats, at times cheering loudly with their hands in the air, other moments were more serious with obscenities being shouted at the TV screens.
Gurnee resident Jim McCormack said he put his head inside his shirt and wept when the Cubs made it into the World Series.
“I was happy it happened in my lifetime,” McCormack said.
Winning it was icing on the cake.
“We never gave up,” McCormack said. “It’s the life of a Cubs fan to hope.”
Before the rain briefly halted the game in Cleveland, McCormack was expecting the worst outcome. One he’s been all too familiar with since age seven when, he said, he began watching the Cubs play from his living room.
“I’ve been through so much. I’m prepared. I’ve seen everything,” McCormack said.
After the Cubs’ win, McCormack popped the cork on a bottle of champagne and sprayed the bubbly liquid across the entire room.
“Nothing beats this feeling,” he said.
In a pink Cubs shirt and a matching tutu, 3-year-old Lily Cervantes of Waukegan was the youngest of Cubs fans inside the restaurant Wednesday night. Lily’s dad, Luis Cervantes, works at Kaiser’s.
After her favorite team scored their fourth run, Lily ran from her parents’ table screaming, “Go Cubs,” and high-fiving in her way.
“She watches all the games with her dad,” said her mom, Michelle Sanchez.
Lily didn’t make it to the final moments of the game, as she fell asleep on two chairs way before the 7th inning, but she was still the envy of many, including her grandfather, Jimmy Sanchez.
“I waited 58 years to see the Cubs win the World Series, my granddaughter gets to experience it at 3,” Sanchez said.
Still stunned by the win. Sanchez called many friends from his cell phone.
“It’s just unbelievable. What a series. What a game,” Sanchez said. “They could write a movie about tonight. I just gotta take it in and enjoy it.”
Yadira Sanchez Olson is a freelance reporter for the News-Sun.
