I promise you this is not going to turn into a basketball blog

I wasn’t planning on writing about the second day of the NCAA tournament here in the ‘ham (day 1 for the women) but too much cool stuff happened to not. Soon, I promise, it’ll be back to volleyball, along with an important announcement with regards to The Net Set itself. But today, it was basketball again, and it was a whole lot of fun.

First match of the day was UC San Diego against Grand Canyon, another instance of seeing schools I know from men’s volleyball. I didn’t arrive until shortly before the end of the first half, due to this nasty habit of mine called sleeping (I really try to do it as little as possible). It was a tight game throughout until the ‘lopes made a run at the end to win by 11.

About 20 minutes before the next game was to start, a fire alarm went off in the gymnasium. We all had to clear out and stand out in the rain for a few minutes while a fire crew entered the gym. It was only a few minutes before they gave the all-clear. The culprit? Burned popcorn. I kid you not.

That next game was Simon Fraser against Northwest Nazarene. That’s the Clan against the Crusaders, two very potentially offensive nicknames, but I guess nobody really minds. I quite unexpectedly wound up in the Simon Fraser rooting section — it sort of formed around me, after very few people came to the first game of the day.

And they brought cheerleaders and even a damn mascot with them. They made signs, painted their faces, painted their chests, they were into it in a big, big way. They made it a home court advantage for their team, and I really dug the school spirit they brought (their entire football team bussed down to see the game). And as it so happened, that game had precisely the same final score as the first one. Makes me more than a little disappointed Simon Fraser’s volleyball program is so terrible, because if it could even come close to going toe-to-toe with ours, I think the gym could really rock those nights.

I really hope it’s us against them in the regional finals, and that our fans bring it, because they really didn’t today. Sure, the WWU match had the best attendance of any all day, and there were some die-hards from the colossal student section last night who came back tonight to do what they do, but it was all a pale shadow of the night before. Our girls kept the game (against something called Academy of Art) interesting, actually trailing by 3 points at halftime, but safely put it away in the second half to win by 20. I wrote a letter to the editor of the school paper telling people to come out and support these ladies, because they sure deserve it. Probably won’t be published before Monday’s game (though maybe online), but it felt good to write it.

And before our game in the nightcap, the game in which I really was least interested turned out to be the best game. Cal State Monterey Bay beat Chico State on a last-second layup. I was able to congratulate some members of the team afterward (they came and sat near where I was in the stands), and they seemed appreciative. One of the team members had a box of donuts from a local bakery (don’t you carb-load before a game and not after?) and I swear to god one of them had breakfast cereal on it.

Turned out the PA announcer was a different guy from the day before, and this guy did the job much in the same style I did. So, that is to say, I enjoyed his work quite a bit more than the other guy. I wanted to go walk by the scorer’s table (at halftime of one of the games) to go give him my kudos, but I got stopped by a tough guy in a yellow coat (event staff). No, asshole, I don’t have a ticket for this side of the gym, and maybe if I was gonna sit there that might matter. Thankfully, I did catch up with him in the hallway by the restrooms. My only qualm with his work was that he called every match the same — I would have held back a little for the home team in the nightcap. But that’s much less than my problems with the other guy.

Another full-day session Monday, and I am really looking forward to it. I don’t think I’ll write about it (unless something amazing happens). Sorry I missed covering this weekend’s volleyball action; I’ll get my recap/power rankings post out tomorrow sometime for Monday’s poll. So from here on, it should be back to volleyball. Thanks for bearing with me, because I had an absolute blast this weekend watching a game about which I know pretty much nothing.