Bradley Center for Decorum Control

This blog took in the entire Pepsi Blue & Gold Classic on Friday and Saturday, as North Dakota State upset Marquette in the tournament final, essentially making it the Pepsi Green & Gold Classic. This followed up last year's Winthrop upset of MU in the final (Pepsi Maroon & Gold Classic), so the Golden Eagles are having a hard time winning their own tournament as of late.

While seeing Marquette fall to unheralded NDSU was mildly humorous, much more humorous were the following quotes during the consolation game, which featured the Princeton Tigers vs. the Northwestern State Demons.

Game quotes:

NW St.'s Luke Rogers pulls up limping on their possession, walks off the court during their possession and garners an official's timeout. He talks to the trainer briefly and then returns to the game. (he should have been forced to sit with the official timeout, and Princeton's head coach Joe Scott understandably complains). Hearing Scott's complaint, NW St. head coach Mike McConathy shouts over to him, with extreme sarcasm: "Oh, well I apologize. We'll see what you do if one of your guys gets injured."

Later in the game....After Keithan Hancock misses a layup, McConathy believes there was a foul on the play. (It looked fine from Pun City's vantage point, but McConathy was already sending in 5 substitutes, so there might not have been much else to do at this point). McConathy glares at the official the entire length of the floor, until he sets up right next to McConathy. At this point, McConathy screams "THAT WAS YOUR CALL!!" Play continues and McConathy continues to give the official the business. Approximately 8 seconds later, he receives a technical foul. After receiving the T, an again-sarcastic McConathey proclaims, "Well I'm sorry if I wasn't 'Po-lit-icly Correct' in front of 35 PEOPLE!!" Of course, McConathey was wrong, there had to have been at least 90 spectators in the 18,600-seat Bradley Center.

Later in the first half, Marcellas Ross appears to have a cramp and is noticeably limping down the court while playing defense. (At this point Princeton is bringing the ball up the court, methodically as always). McConathy calls over to the official, "I've got an injured player when you get a dead ball. 42's injured when you get a dead ball." Because Princeton is taking so long to advance the ball up court, the official grants the timeout and stops play. Scott, unaware of the injury, repeatedly asks, "Why is there a stoppage of play? Why is there a stop?" The official, unnecessarily incensed at this point, sprints over to Scott, then gets right in his face to say "I'll tell you why there's a dead ball! Because 42 is injured!!" An annoyed Scott holds up both hands and says "I was just asking you a question."

So very amusing from this blog's standpoint, it was nice to be able to get close enough to hear all of the banter.

This blog also saw Marquette's win over the Delaware State Hornets tonight, very little of note there except former MU star and current radio color commentator Jim McIlvaine played drums in the band for the night. This was both cheesy and appropriate because McIlvaine always wears a band shirt to the games when broadcasting.

Supposedly McIlvaine was attempting to become the tallest member of a collegiate pep band. He played a decent amount of songs competently, but abstained from playing any drum-only cadences and missed a few minutes while being interviewed on the radio broadcast. This blog will give him credit though, he didn't just play the bass drum a couple times and act like he was "all that." This blog probably wouldn't have noticed him if it hadn't heard his partner mention the change in duty during the pre-game broadcast.

Can't wait for the Wisconsin-Marquette matchup on Saturday, this should be one of the best games in the history of the rivalry in terms of combined rankings. This blog predicts a Wisconsin victory, 63-62.