Birth of the Trip:
Like all great ideas the tourney trip was hatched by two guys talking bull shit to each other in an Allen Park basement. As it was originally conceived Jimmy and I were going to make the short drive into Chicago to catch some games on the Friday/Sunday miss no class and spend our evenings back in Kalamazoo at my dorm room. It was a modest plan for two college students with limited time and financial resources. As fate would have it Chicago’s United Center was sold out, and without much thought and just a few mouse clicks we purchased two tickets for the Thursday/Saturday games in St. Louis. A trip I had made a few years earlier with my dad to watch Michigan State in the Midwest Regionals and as I recalled seemed drivable.
The St. Louis Trip:
We headed through Illinois towards the Gateway to the West armed with a newly purchased CD player some Pete Yorn, some Oasis and some philosophical conversation that would have made Gandhi look like a drooling moron. The Red Roof Inn on the outskirts of town was base camp for this one. With only one of us at drinking age at this point we were not doing any bar hoping or even partaking in nightly spirits. Instead we were just enjoying a fast food diet (when we ate at all), and the PS2 that we brought along to help fill the idle hours. NHL 03 was a hell of a game and Corey Stillman is a game changer by the way. The most significant off day activity that year was a tour of old Busch Stadium. Where we were told stories of Mark McGwire and shown through the dugout, offices, suites, etc… There is nothing better than spending roughly 12 hours at a stadium to wake up the next day and take a tour of an empty stadium to refresh you for going back to a stadium the next day for another 6 hours. I still shake my head at that choice.
As for the games it’s important to understand that Kentucky basketball fans roll hard. These people bring loads of spoiled rotten, unrealistic, basketball elitists, wearing blue and white jumpsuits with them to make every game feel like a home game. The Kentucky fan will spend the entire game encouraging “the cats” by softly saying comm uwn tayshawn or comm uwn ray, etc… and occasionally telling their wife what an ass the ref is for “making that call.” They are not an easy bunch of people to understand if you have never encountered them in the past. With that being said they weren’t our favorites. That was reserved for the semi-local (Northern Indiana) Valparaiso Crusaders and their legendary soft spoken giant killing coach Homer Drew. At this point in time the memory of Bryce Drew and the classic upset of Ole Miss in 98 was still fresh in the minds of college basketball fans and this game was a popular upset choice for many brave souls who believed in Valpo and their gang of foreign born players.
Unfortunately this game was never that competitive.
Marquette was still one year away from making a run to the final four but they were in the beginnings of their renaissance lead by former Michigan State assistant Tom Crean and a young exciting guard named Dwayne Wade. They had become one of my favorites that year and we were both very excited to see Wade and co. make a deep tournament run.
That was not to be however as the textbook 12/5 upset occurred by the quintessential mid major sleeper Tulsa Golden Hurricane. For much of the game Tulsa was just building a lead. They looked much quicker than Marquette, and were beating them to the spot all day long. Marquette did manage to cut through a 14 point lead and tie the game up but Tulsa hit a runner with :14 left and managed the win.
It was before the Kansas/ Holy Cross game that it was decided to make this trip an annual event. It was our theory that if we saw enough games then we would eventually see those classic Bryce Drew, Tyus Edney, or NC State moments that you always see replayed time and again every March. We were absolutely convinced that we would be witness to history. Even more so when Holy Cross hung in and actually had a lead at the under 4! Here we go a 16 over a 1 we thought. Nope. Drew Gooden and the Jayhawks prevailed.
As we sat there watching an absolutely brutal game between Western Kentucky and Stanford to close the evening we were tired and thrilled. We sat on the precipice of an annual tradition that would soon include more friends and more stories than we would have ever hoped.
The 2nd round games were uneventful for the most part except that Tayshawn Prince was memorably dominate against Tulsa and would soon become one of our favorite Pistons. We also had the first of many positive encounters with Kansas Jayhawk fans who soon became our favorite blue bloods and caused me to briefly entertain the notion that Drew Gooden was a sure fire NBA all star.
We were on our way.
