Thwok.

Once you’ve heard that sound — once you’ve walked across the green on an Annapolis spring day to send a wooden ball through the wicket — you’ll recognize it forever.

Thwok.

Amid applause and swing band harmonies, that’s the sound of the Annapolis Cup.

For more than 40 years, Johnnies from St. John’s College and Naval Academy midshipmen have turned out on the college lawn to play croquet.

The cup is a pure moment of college sports, a matchup of the mismatched. It’s a game where strategy can beat athleticism, where fun when the weather turns nice is the real prize.

It’s always been a contrast in style. But never like Saturday.

On one side of King George Street, the Naval Academy banned 373 books from its Nimitz Library last week. It’s the latest move to obey executive orders coming from Washington to purge diversity, equity and inclusion.

Officially, mids get the lesson.

“I think the message is fairly clear,” said Vice Adm. Yvette Davids, the academy superintendent. “We’re going to follow our leadership, and we’re going to be in line with the executive order.”

Across the street, St. John’s students study the Great Books.

“Our method of teaching is based on the text,” President Nora Demleitner said. “So, in a class, students would not be discussing current events. What they’re saying in the hallways, in the dormitories at night, is a very different issue.”

On Friday, the Navy released the list of titles pulled from its 590,000 books, plucked like an offending eye, before Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth addressed the mids Tuesday.

You’ll recognize some titles, old favorites of book banners. “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou was among them.

“I grew up in Germany, so book bans are just an anathema to me,” Demleitner said. “I’ve seen photos of the 1930s when the Nazis not only pulled the books but burned the books.”

They’ll be reading Angelou on Saturday at City Dock as a protest. People offended by the purge plan to read it aloud as 48 hours of free speech.

Thwok.

Mids in summer whites, Gold N varsity sweaters embroidered with the team motto — “we are not here for a long time, we are here for a good time” — spread across the field.

Johnnies are in green capes that might be intended as camouflage. Who knows?

Thwok.

“St. John’s is ahead in the match, 2-1,” the announcer says.

This year’s cup is taking place in an age of book bans.

PEN America, a New York-based nonprofit, publishes a list of titles removed from libraries and school shelves because of right-wing objections over discussions of race, gender and sexuality. In February, it counted more than 10,000 book bans affecting more than 4,000 titles.

There are a lot of books you won’t recognize on the Navy’s list. One is a 2019 research project by a midshipman, an exploration on how police violence affects public opinion. No one has said yet where it and the other books went.

At St. John’s, students read Hawthorne’s meditation on sin in “The Scarlet Letter” and Twain’s critique of American slavery and hypocrisy in “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.”

They read de Beauvoir on sexism, Marx on capitalism and Baldwin’s explanation of racism to white people.

“I wanted to be confronted with ideas that have shaped the world I live in,” said Helen, a student from Germany.

We agreed not to use her last name. Federal agents are sweeping up foreign students who dissent. She’s writing her thesis on de Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America,” with his warning about tyranny of the majority.

“Sometimes it’s not great to read about an author who doesn’t think very highly about women,” Helen said of Nietzsche and others. “But his opinions have still shaped the world.”

Midshipmen, ordered not to step ahead of their superior officers, could say nothing about President Donald Trump’s remaking of the academy and America.

“I can’t answer that question, sir,” a member of the Class of 2025 said.

The news media was barred from Hegseth’s all-hands address Tuesday to mids, but the Pentagon put out an account that cast it as a hero’s welcome.

“Nothing replaces being grounded in faith,” he told the mids, according to the official account. “For me [that is] where truth comes from.”

Unofficial accounts say some of the 4,000-strong brigade cheered. Others did not.

“The mids right now, sir, are focused on being the best possible officers they can be,” Davids said. “They’re getting ready to fly, go on aircraft carriers ... be Marines.

“I find the questions I get are about the fine-tuning of their leadership, to be prepared for when they go out there.”

Thwok.

The music played on through the afternoon; Naptown Brass serpentined through the crowd in a second line.

They played Beyonce’s “Crazy in Love” as a New Orleans dance fest, drawing students and others out for a spin. There were pretty dresses, fancy suits, same-sex couples, trans students and one guy channeling Edgar Allan Poe all twirling with friends.

Davids played croquet at the academy, part of the generation of women who changed Annapolis as the ladies of the ‘80s. She doesn’t think Trump’s executive orders will keep others from following in her wake.

“We get 16,000 applications at the Naval Academy,” she said. “We’re in great hands.”

Yet no one signed up to invade Greenland.

Thwok.

“On Court 3, red and black have both made the turn.“

How did America come to this? On King George Street, books are celebrated on one side and culled as unacceptable on the other.

How long before someone notices the Naval Academy seal includes an open book, or its motto Ex Scientia Tridens — from knowledge, seapower.

Thwok.

“Navy takes the victory, 4-3.”

Navy won, leveling up the series since the pandemic.

“USA! USA! USA!” mids chanted. “USA!”

It was the Annapolis Cup. A good time was had by all.