Storming the Floor Etiquette

This is a few days late, but since nobody besides me watched, or gave a shit, that UWGB rolled up then 6th ranked Butler the other night, I thought I could write this now and be OK. See, after the win, the UWGB fans stormed the court like they had just won a championship of some sort. To be fair, according to my cursory review of UWGB basketball history, this is only the third ever home win over a ranked opponent, so it was a very big win for the program and everyone should be excited. But I have a number of problems with the storming of the court:

1) Last week the student section appeared to have about 30 people in it. So the majority of the people storming the court are bandwagon jumpers, and shouldn't have the right to act that excited.

2) UWGB is still in second place after the win.

3) It was a regular season game, that was really for nothing other than bragging rights, and seedings, seeing as UWGB has ZERO chance at an at-large bid, and Butler is probably getting one anyway.

4) It wasn't THAT big of an upset.

In my mind there is a series of rules that need to be followed before court storming is appropriate. As Walter says, "This isn't 'Nam. There are rules!!!". If any one of these things happens, a storming is appropriate. I am happy to provide such a list:

1) The win clinches an NCAA birth. Even if you are Duke and you go every year, it is hard to do, and a celebration is warranted. There is nothing cooler than a really small mid-major doing this after their first appearance in 45 years.

2) You are unranked, and the win is against the number one ranked team. Not 6, not 20, but NUMBER ONE.

3) The win is a monumental upset. If you are the last place team and beat a ranked opponent for the first time ever, it is acceptable ONCE. If you are historically terrible and you snap a losing streak to that team that is more than 20 games long, it is acceptable, ONCE.

4) It is a hotly contested conference game, between good rivals, and the game ends on a miraculous buzzer beater. If the sheer emotion of the ending ends in the players in a pile up, the fans are allowed to join in.

5) You win a national title.

That's it. That's the list. The storming of the court in Green Bay earlier in the week was amateur hour.

Bracket Busters Overview

So the pairings for this year's Bracket Busters have just been released. CU will host George Mason who has a fairly similar record, and is also third place in their conference. I am slightly disappointed that we didn't get to see a UW-Green Bay-CU matchup. UWGB is 15-6 overall, and 9-2 in the Horizon League. I would think it would be a pretty even matchup. Instead, they are shipping to Green Bay to Long Beach to take on the 11-9 "Dirtbags".

I guess it doesn't really matter all that much, since neither team is probably getting an at-large bid anyway, but it would have been kind of fun to see. I guess I should probably be glad CU doesn't have to play UWGB since the Phoenix is handling #6 Butler 55-45 with 8 minutes left as I write this.

By the way, the Horizon League has it right when it comes to broadcasting their sports. Instead of having a fascist and archaic pay per view system like CU has (which is something like $79.99 a year). The Horizon League broadcasts almost all of their games online for FREE. It would be pretty tits if I watched alot of GB games. I sort of don't have room to root strongly for three NCAA teams, and right now UW and CU hold those spots. Plus, I don't really want to be bandwagon and start rooting hard for UWGB just because they are sort of good this year. That would be lame.