Tweet
My friend Jazz ask that I give a full report of the GU-BYU game last night, so here goes.
Mrs. F1Dog and I arrived early. It may or may not surprise you that the BYU fan base and community has a bit of Jeckyl and Hyde quality to it. Before tip off, everyone is nice as pie. Smiling, clear eyed, polite and gracious as could be.
Sports at BYU are a BIG deal and they really put a lot of effort around the event. First, it was senior night and they had all the dignitaries out to greet the seniors. I was surprised to see that 2 (was it 3) of the young men being honored were in street clothes. I hadn't realized how decimated the team was with injuries.
Then, they rolled out no fewer than 200 Air Force ROTC cadets to sing the national anthem(think Mormon Tabernacle Choir style.) It was nice.
The starting five for BYU was presented in a glitzy, rocking show that I think many NBA teams would be envious of. It started with a video of Jimmer (of course) saying it was time to get ready. This got the crowd into such a frenzy that ear plugs might not have been a bad idea. And, as most of you know, that energy never really was tempered. The BYU faithful had it on tap to spare any time they needed it and those folks are loud. They also reflexively and as a unit will all stand up in unison, all 20,000, when the situation calls for it. People don't sit on their hands in that place. Which is a good thing and a bad thing, depending on your perspective.
At the tip, things were at a frenzy but it quieted down a bit as our Zags took early control of the game.
At about 4 or 5 minutes into the game, a late arriving gentleman and BYU fan came in and took his seat next to me. Todd, it turns out, has connections to the BYU team and is a former high school basketball coach. He's also family friends with the Bollinger family, Royce Bollinger being Gonzaga Baseball's all time leading hitter. So, he had a lot of respect for Gonzaga and for our team and I had a lot of fun chatting with him due to his knowledge of the game..... EXCEPT, like all other BYU fans, when the calls weren't going there way. I could tell he was trying to restrain himself, because of his new GU friend, but by the end he just couldn't help himself and was outraged, OUTRAGED at the injustice that was the refereeing. Like I said, Jeckyl and Hyde.
My new BYU friend had a lot to say about the football player in a basketball uniform. That he's apparently a nice kid, who's very mild mannered. He's only playing basketball on loan from the football team and he'll be one and done on the basketball team because his coach won't let him risk his very promising football career.
As the game progressed and the score got tighter, the atmosphere just got crazy in there. I think the only time I've been in an atmosphere louder than that was when I had the privilege of attending ESPN Gameday at the Kennel vs. Stanford.
The one thing that surprised me is that when GU went up by 5 inside of a minute is that some of the crowd started to hit the exits. It seemed out of character. The intensity, surprisingly for me, didn't drop off when our guys fouled them in the act of shooting a three and the game got close again.
When the final buzzer sounded and the game had ended, all the BYU faithful went back to nice as pie. Its almost surreal. Nicest folks you'd ever want to meet, just don't challenge them to a sporting event, I guess.
I won't put out another post about the details of the game, that is already being discussed here in a dozen other threads.
Overall, we did enjoy ourselves. I didn't get into any altercations this year
and Gonzaga won the game!
There ya go, Jazz.
Mrs. F1Dog and I arrived early. It may or may not surprise you that the BYU fan base and community has a bit of Jeckyl and Hyde quality to it. Before tip off, everyone is nice as pie. Smiling, clear eyed, polite and gracious as could be.
Sports at BYU are a BIG deal and they really put a lot of effort around the event. First, it was senior night and they had all the dignitaries out to greet the seniors. I was surprised to see that 2 (was it 3) of the young men being honored were in street clothes. I hadn't realized how decimated the team was with injuries.
Then, they rolled out no fewer than 200 Air Force ROTC cadets to sing the national anthem(think Mormon Tabernacle Choir style.) It was nice.
The starting five for BYU was presented in a glitzy, rocking show that I think many NBA teams would be envious of. It started with a video of Jimmer (of course) saying it was time to get ready. This got the crowd into such a frenzy that ear plugs might not have been a bad idea. And, as most of you know, that energy never really was tempered. The BYU faithful had it on tap to spare any time they needed it and those folks are loud. They also reflexively and as a unit will all stand up in unison, all 20,000, when the situation calls for it. People don't sit on their hands in that place. Which is a good thing and a bad thing, depending on your perspective.
At the tip, things were at a frenzy but it quieted down a bit as our Zags took early control of the game.
At about 4 or 5 minutes into the game, a late arriving gentleman and BYU fan came in and took his seat next to me. Todd, it turns out, has connections to the BYU team and is a former high school basketball coach. He's also family friends with the Bollinger family, Royce Bollinger being Gonzaga Baseball's all time leading hitter. So, he had a lot of respect for Gonzaga and for our team and I had a lot of fun chatting with him due to his knowledge of the game..... EXCEPT, like all other BYU fans, when the calls weren't going there way. I could tell he was trying to restrain himself, because of his new GU friend, but by the end he just couldn't help himself and was outraged, OUTRAGED at the injustice that was the refereeing. Like I said, Jeckyl and Hyde.
My new BYU friend had a lot to say about the football player in a basketball uniform. That he's apparently a nice kid, who's very mild mannered. He's only playing basketball on loan from the football team and he'll be one and done on the basketball team because his coach won't let him risk his very promising football career.
As the game progressed and the score got tighter, the atmosphere just got crazy in there. I think the only time I've been in an atmosphere louder than that was when I had the privilege of attending ESPN Gameday at the Kennel vs. Stanford.
The one thing that surprised me is that when GU went up by 5 inside of a minute is that some of the crowd started to hit the exits. It seemed out of character. The intensity, surprisingly for me, didn't drop off when our guys fouled them in the act of shooting a three and the game got close again.
When the final buzzer sounded and the game had ended, all the BYU faithful went back to nice as pie. Its almost surreal. Nicest folks you'd ever want to meet, just don't challenge them to a sporting event, I guess.
I won't put out another post about the details of the game, that is already being discussed here in a dozen other threads.
Overall, we did enjoy ourselves. I didn't get into any altercations this year
and Gonzaga won the game!There ya go, Jazz.
Comment