The Jays return home tonight to host the Bradley Braves, a team who comes into the game with records of 13-11 and 7-6 in the league. These two teams' first meeting turned out to be an interesting juncture in the Braves season, as they entered that game with a 4-0 record in the league. Their loss to the Jays that day was the beginning of a 3-6 slide that has dropped them into a tie for fourth place and on the edge of the Thursday Play-In game in St. Louis.
As for Creighton, they're playing their most impressive basketball of the season and are coming off two solid road wins that put them in position to get their 20th win of the year tonight. More important that extending their streaks of 20 wins overall and 10 in the league, however, is winning to keep pace with the suddenly-catchable Northern Iowa. Even if UNI doesn't falter down the stretch, second place and an advantageous seed in St. Louis is Creighton's to lose. Win out, and its theirs.
The streaks seem to be the story heading into this game, however, garnering Rodney Buford his first appearance on the cover -- above the fold no less -- of the Omaha World-Herald in almost a decade. A photo montage of the great players in the Altman era graced the banner at the top of the paper this morning, dubbing the era the Roaring Twenties. A win tonight gives them 20 wins for the 11th straight year, and 10 conference wins for the 13th straight year.
No MVC school has ever recorded more than six straight 20 win seasons. Only Stanford and Kansas have longer streaks of 10 or more conference wins.
Attendance has been another major story this week, although the focus of the story seems to be misguided. A front-page sports section story on Tuesday delved into the sparse student section attendance in recent games, particularly the Indiana State and Missouri State games. The reported attendance for Missouri State was just under 250 students, leaving 650 empty seats. It looked terrible on TV to have so many empty seats so close to the court, especially when the rest of the arena was pretty full.
Student attendance is an issue at lots of schools, and with an undergraduate enrollment of roughly 3,700 getting 900 students to come is an impressive percentage. Some games things will transpire to make the number lower. I wish the A.D. could do something different with ticket distribution so that those seats could be filled in by someone. There's thousands of people in the far reaches of the upper bowl getting nosebleeds that I'm sure would sacrifice their mini donut privileges for a year to sit closer to the court.
No, the real shame with how the attendance story was focused is that the most interesting news was buried at the bottom in a notes section -- Creighton's average attendance this season puts them in 10th place nationally. This of course gives even more ammunition to the haters, who for whatever reason -- jealousy, ignorance, or douchebaggery -- refuse to believe the numbers are legit.
Look, to be sure, when you see the Top 10 Creighton is the name that makes you do a double-take. Kentucky, North Carolina, Tennessee, Syracuse, Louisville, Memphis, Wisconsin, Maryland, and Kansas read like a whos-who of College Hoops. Then you see Creighton on the list. Behind them are Arkansas, Marquette, Illinois, Ohio State and Indiana.
This is astounding, isn't it? Yet somehow we find ourselves having to defend being tenth in attendance, like we're supposed to be modest about it and apologize for averaging 16,000 a night. Nebraska fans claim people who go are really Husker fans that only go to drink beer. Iowa State fans claim people who go are too dumb to have figured out the product is inferior.
Excuse me, why does Creighton have to defend 16,000 people coming out to their games? This is a fact that should be celebrated, not defended. I'm sorry, my language is going to take a temporary diversion into saltytown...
Why the (expletive) does it matter what people's reasons are for going to the games? The fact of the (expletive) matter is, they're going, they're spending money -- yes, sometimes on beer -- and they're watching basketball. Some of them get their tickets for free, some of them come late and leave early, some of them don't care who wins the game. But the fact of the (expletive) (expletive) matter is, Creighton's averaging over 16,000 a game, they've been over 15,000 for four years now, and those numbers are probably not going to decrease any time soon. I'm sorry your team doesn't draw as well, but that's not my (expletive) problem and I'm done (expletive) defending the fact that CU draws so well. (expletive) (expletive) (expletive).
Whew. Someday I'll have to let you all know how I really feel about this. Until then...on to the fun stuff, after the jump.
One Big Paragraph With Lots O'Dots (TM): The series with Bradley is amazingly close, with the Braves holding a 39-38 advantage. The Jays, however, have won 10 straight battles in Omaha and are 22-13 all-time at home ... Bizarre as it seems, the key would seem to be scoring more than 70 and holding Bradley under 65. In the last 26 games between BU and CU, the Jays are 14-1 when holding the Braves under 65 points, and the Jays are 19-0 when scoring more than 70 points. Hope for pizza, and a win should come with it ... Jim Les is incredibly already in his seventh season on the bench for Bradley, and owns a 118-101 record. He's just 3-12 against Creighton, however ... Theron Wilson has been a perennial thorn in the Bluejays side, and has extended that pain to every opponent thus far. He leads the team in scoring, rebounding, and steals, and has attempted a staggering 157 free throws, making 70% of them.
The Last Time They Played: Creighton earned a hard-fought 73-64 win in the teams' first meeting. I described the team as having played with tremendous confidence and heart, proclaiming for the umpteenth time this season that they'd turned a corner...
Jimmy The Greek Memorial Odds: Creighton by 9.5; over/under is 137.
Gratuitous Linkage: Anything that hastens the demise of the worst idea in sports television in recent memory is OK in my book. Please God, let this be the end of "Interactive Tuesday" on ESPN. Please.
Official Gametime Snack: If the Jays get close to the Pizza Threshold, they win this game, as I pointed out above. So obviously, tonight's snack is pizza. Enjoy it!
The totally random song I'd play right now if I were still a radio DJ: Motley Crue's Kickstart my Heart. I saw these guys in concert last night and I'm still in pain. Something about them just makes you party that much harder, for that much longer, and the older you get the more it hurts. Damn you. Damn you for being so Awesome.
Prediction: Jays 75, Bradley 65.
