Students should storm the court

The final seconds were ticking off the clock. The Illinois Fighting Illini were about to knock off No. 6-ranked Michigan State. When the clock struck zero, a wave of orange and blue flooded the court as the student section tore out of the stands and onto the hardwood, celebrating like they just won a national championship.

College basketball analyst Dick Vitale, who was providing commentary for the game, was aghast. Vitale said that Illinois did not need to rush the court for this win, because their men’s basketball program has enjoyed so much success. Former Fighting Illini standout Dee Brown, who played on the 2004-05 team that went 37-2 and fell to North Carolina in the national championship, posted a tweet on his Twitter account after the game, saying that the student section shouldn’t have rushed the court because Illini basketball is used to winning.

Many diehard Hoosier fans would take one look at the five national championship banners hanging on the wall in Assembly Hall, and say the Crimson Guard never needs to rush the floor because we are too successful for that. But given the last decade of IU basketball, where is our success?

Indiana University won national championships in 1940, 1953, 1976, 1981, and 1987. Doing the math, that would mean almost no undergraduates were born before the Hoosiers’ last national championship win. The upcoming NCAA men’s basketball tournament will mark three years since IU last made the tournament, and 23 years since the Hoosiers last cut down the nets as champions.

To put it in better perspective, Notre Dame was once a powerhouse football program. From 1924-1988, they produced eleven national championships, with undefeated records, Heisman trophy winners, and NFL stardom players to go with those titles.

But what have they done lately?  They are on now on their fourth coach in a decade, with the previous three having been fired. The Irish have collected one bowl game win since 1995. In the last three seasons, they’ve lost to Navy twice, Air Force once, and an eight-loss Syracuse team.

This means if you are a Southern California, Purdue, Michigan, or Michigan St. fan, and a Notre Dame fan tries to brag about their history of greatness, you can safely laugh and say something along the lines of, “That’s great, good luck with the next military school you have to play.”

Unfortunately, it’s the same situation for Hoosier basketball fans. If you start bragging to a Purdue basketball fan about IU’s history of national titles, they’re going to remind you that they’ve been consistently ranked in the Top-10 most of year, that they’ve beaten IU three straight times, and that IU basketball has missed the tournament four of the past seven years.

If you are currently a student, it’s been a rough tenure for you as a Hoosier basketball fan, no matter which class you are in. Here’s the breakdown:

The freshmen class has a 10-20 record.  They are the same age as our heralded freshmen recruiting class, who are the future of Indiana basketball. Their first year in the student section has been one of many growing pains, as they’ve watched each freshmen go through the learning curve of Division I basketball.

The sophomore class has a 16-45 record.  Their first year in the student section was Tom Crean’s first on the sideline, as they witnessed the damage that Kelvin Sampson visited on the program, as a team assembled mostly of walk-ons fought and clawed for six wins.

The junior class has a record of 41-53.  As freshmen, they enjoyed some success, as the Hoosiers were ranked for much of the season, but in February the program monumentally collapsed as Kelvin Sampson resigned after being accused of violating NCAA recruiting rules. The junior class is now on their third coach in three years, including interim coach Dan Dakich.

The seniors are 62-64 in their four years here. They have gone through just about every type of situation possible as a member of the student section. Everything from a Top-10 ranked team, to first and second round exits in March Madness, to a coach having to resign because of major recruiting violations, to the bottom of the Big Ten.

Hoosier Nation, especially the alumni and the season ticket holders from the Bobby Knight era, know what the winning tradition of Indiana basketball is, but we as students do not.  There is no doubt we’ve been informed about it, and there is no doubt we’ve seen the classic games on TV, but we haven’t witnessed it. We haven’t been a part of the continuity the program had for almost thirty years. There was one coach from 1971-2000, but there have been five since 2000 up until now.

The Hoosiers are still looking for their first win against a ranked team under Tom Crean, to say nothing of looking for their first signature win against a Top-10 team.  Over the past two years, ranked team after ranked team has come to Assembly Hall, and each time we have fallen short.

But I believe that signature win is coming. Whether it’s next season or the season after, a Top-10 ranked team is going to come to Bloomington, and we are going to knock them off.

And when that game clock strikes zero, I hope our student section storms the court.

And when you storm it, do it for the faithful season ticket holders, who for so many years enjoyed success under Bobby Knight, and have stuck with the Hoosiers through these tough years as they are rebuilding their image.

Storm it for Tom Crean, who has poured nothing short of his whole heart into this basketball program, who left a consistent contender at Marquette to rebuild a collapsed program in need of a coach who still believed in us.

Storm it for our players, who turned down scholarship offers to contending ACC, SEC, and Big East teams because they believed in Tom Crean, and were looked to the first day they set foot on campus to turn our program around.

And finally, storm it for yourselves, because you stayed with your team through their darkest hours, and sang the fight song for them at every home game as loud as you could. And as Hoosier Nation as a whole, we are showing the Big Ten and the whole country, that we are back, and never daunted, we will not falter.

Tags: dan dakich, history banners, indiana basketball, kelvin sampson, mike davis, ranked team, storm the court, storming, tom crean, top 10, upset