Live from Austin, it's Saturday night
Published: 2/21/2009 7:23 PM
Last Modified: 2/21/2009 7:23 PM
So what's it like inside the Frank Erwin Center leading up to a big Oklahoma-Texas basketball game? Here's a peek…
An hour and a half before tipoff, there are about a hundred UT students behind both baskets. They've been admitted a half-hour before everyone else to give the big, sterile arena some feeling, but it doesn't work too great. They find foam burnt orange headgear in the shape of longhorns in their seats. Putting them on has to make them feel more like dorks than fans, no offense to the UT marketing department.
Rick Barnes shows up on the video board thanking the students for their early arrival, and says he'll need their help in a little while. It doesn't generate much response. Nothing does, actually. The Sooners are the only ones out warming up, and there's a taunt every five minutes. That's it. These kids are polite, bored or both.
Meantime, Austin Johnson goes about launching one 35-footer after another, making more than he misses. Think it's an accident the OU point guard makes impossibly long shots? Watch him in warm-ups sometime. It's no accident.
Willie Warren is sitting on the bench dribbling the ball between his legs to the beat of whatever music is blasting into his headphones. Blake Griffin and Cade Davis have chosen those little white I-Pod jobbers while they loosen up.
The ESPN GameDay crew arrives about 80 minutes before tipoff, Jay Bilas followed by Digger Phelps, Hubert Davis, Rece Davis and, finally, Bob Knight, who walks out drinking what I assume to be coffee. The only one of the quintet that elicits any fan reaction is Knight. That's not the fault of the sleepy students, but the fact that the basketball version of GameDay is about 1/100th the draw of football.
(The crew shot their morning show in the arena earlier in the day. An ESPN broadcaster who shall not be named told an OU official that it was the worst-attended GameDay ever.)
Finally, around an hour before tip time, Dick Vitale walks out and there is an actual buzz in the student sections. Some gaffer or key grip walks over to the students and starts handing out autographed glossies of Dickie V. Then the real thing walks over, wades into the front row, steals an orange Longhorns cap from a student and puts it on his bald head.
They're letting fans into the place at this point. The Longhorns have come out to take over half the court. Maybe there's hope for a loud house after all. At the very least, let's hope for a loud game. I'll bet we get one.
Enjoy it.
-- Guerin Emig
Written by
Guerin Emig
Sports Writer
