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Being a lifelong fan of college basketball, there's nothing like being part of the phenomena called March Madness. The NCAA tournament is indeed a special time, with supporters sparing no expense to follow their team across the country, for, as Peter Sinfield said in his poem Pirates:
"There's prizes to be taken, and glory to be found."
So I was overjoyed to be invited to join my buddy Maxwell and his two sons for a road trip down to Austin, Texas for a chance to see my favorite college basketball team, the Cardinals of the University of Louisville, play in the NCAA Tournament. Icing on the cake came from the fact that one of my other favorites, the Wildcats of the University of Kentucky, were playing in the other game of the doubleheader.
Side Note: Such is the reality of Kentucky basketball: a Cardinal fan can freely support the Wildcats, but a Kentucky fan is loathe to speak kindly of Louisville. It's always been that way, but after Coach Pitino left Lexington (it wasn't about the money!), washed out with the Celtics (uuhh Rick, there's no full court defenses in the NBA), wrote that book about basketball at the University of Kentucky (don't look at me, I haven't read it), and then did the unthinkable by taking the Louisville helm (like Figo leaving Barcelona to captain rival Real Madrid, or Sol's supreme $$$ shafting of The Hotspurs en route to Arsenal), the ill will felt by the poor Wildcat fans is simply off the scale. And as a former U of L student...it's sweet revenge for all those decades of being avoided.
So anyway, we arrive in Austin, Texas, find our seats which came courtesy of buddy Gary's long time support of Michigan State University, and settle in to experience this March Madness stuff in pure, uncut form.
It quickly became obvious to me that I'd been away from college basketball a long time, as I watched in horror as two of college basketball's top coaches, Rick Pitino and Tubby Smith, repeatedly stomped the arena's wooden floor to get the attention of the players and fans. Now, we were sitting in the cheap seats, up near the rafters, and even there the sound produced by hard leather soles of the coach's expensive shoes was so loud that I shuddered every time the coaches issued their demand for attention. Why? Because after years of focusing on the player centered game of soccer, I was appalled at the control the basketball coaches required over the match. And as I watched the coaches, I sensed that they savored the fan focus which was brought to them with each stomp of the arena floor.
From what I can understand, Pitino and Smith are not alone in their foot stomping style. Following is a section of the profile page of George Washington's Coach Karl Hobbs:
"In his first season as a head coach, Hobbs also proved to observers that he is much more than a talented recruiter. His frenetic, super-charged coaching style of foot-stomping and piercing whistles on the sidelines did not go unnoticed by media and fans alike. His players couldn't help but put forth the same energy and effort that Hobbs exudes on the bench and from the coaching box. At times he seemed to "will" his team to victory."
Piercing whistles!?! You gotta be kidding me. And now consider that this is from a page which the coach has a great deal of content control. If Coach Hobbs wasn't proud of his foot stomping and whistles, he wouldn't allow such annoying actions to be featured on his official profile page. Thank God I didn't hear any piercing whistles that evening down in Austin.
It's no small wonder to me why you never ever hear the foot stomping during a
television telecast. Why would the producers want something included in
the soundtrack of the game which was so annoying? They wouldn't.
Frankly, in light of that evening's observations, I'm a little ashamed of being so hard on Kentucky's Coach Joe B. Hall all these years. I used to watch him sit and glare at a player who had just made an error, and thought to myself how difficult it would be to play under such a control freak. But in today's reality, his style would likely be considered 'laid back.' Please forgive me, Coach Hall.
Anyway, I'm so annoyed with all this demand for attention by the coaches, I'm all for a rule in college basketball which requires a technical foul be assessed against a college coach for each foot stomp or piercing whistle. In addition, and no doubt inspired by the story of how 'Shoeless Joe' earned his nickname, I'm thinking that a coach should be required to wear house shoe slippers which feature likeness of the opposition's mascot after their 2nd foot stomp in a game. That should be enough to take care of that problem.
Now, did I happen to mention how far Smith and Pitino ventured out onto the court during play? I could dedicate another separate page to that topic, but it really wasn't as grievous simply because it didn't detract from the basic enjoyment of the games the way that foot stomping does.
I'm just so glad that I don't have to endure foot stomping by soccer coaches.
Mike 'Rockin' the Rubber Sole Shoes' Kimbro