To Storm or Not to Storm

On Wednesday, Penn State beat Michigan 84-78.  It wasn't the greatest basketball game ever played but it was significant in that Penn State came into the game riding a 14-game winless streak while Michigan was ranked #4 in the country.  So, when Penn State pulled off the upset (coming from 15 points down in the last 10 minutes), the meager crowd at the Bryce Jordan Center celebrated by storming the court at the final buzzer.

Storming the court to celebrate a big victory is a time-honored college basketball tradition.  It's been going on for as long as I can remember.  Usually, the only reason anyone talks about storming the court is to debate when it's "acceptable" to do it.  There are a couple of basic rules upon which most sports fans can agree.  Here are five of them:

• If you're ranked outside the top 10 and you just beat the number one team in the nation, you're allowed to storm the court.
• If you're ranked outside the top 5 and you beat a top 5 team on a buzzer beater, you can storm the court.
• If your team plays for a mid-major conference and you upset a perennial power from one of the big name conferences, you can storm the court (although, given the economics of collegiate sports, you'll probably be playing this game on the road and might find yourself storming the court all on your own).
• If your team plays for a mid-major conference and you just won your conference championship to advance to the NCAA tournament, you can storm the court.
• And, finally, there's the cardinal rule about when you're not allowed to storm the court.  That rule applies if your school has won the national championship more than once.  In that case, you're never allowed to storm the court.

This all brings us to Duke and their long-time coach Mike Krzyzewski.  Last night, after seeing his Blue Devils lose on the road for the fourth time this season, he got to experience the court-storming sensation for a fourth time.  He was not a happy camper.  At his post-game press conference, Coach K went on a little diatribe (without raising his voice, of course) about how all this court storming has gotten out of control.  He claims to be concerned about his safety and that of his players.

Now, I am not a Duke fan.  The best explanation I can give you for why I don't like Duke basketball is that I'm jealous.  Yep.  Jealous.  I freely admit that I struggle with other people who are better looking, or more successful, or more well-liked than me.  Sometimes, I can get past all that.  But not with Duke's basketball teams.  You see, Duke's basketball teams generally meet all three of those criteria.  So, when I heard Coach K complaining on Sportscenter this morning about how unfair and scary it was that his poor little Dukies were getting swallowed up in the crowd at U-VA last night, I didn't feel badly for him at all.  In fact, I kind of enjoyed it.