Over the weekend I visited some friends in Louisville, and it was my first time staying more than a day in the great state of Kentucky. On Friday night, we headed out to a bar and caught the end of the North Carolina-Ohio Sweet 16 game, which was almost the coolest thing ever. Really, though, we were heading out to catch the Kentucky-Indiana game, a game that I didn't particularly care about, and my friends sort of cared about because now they live in Kentucky. We got to Molly Malone's and it took all of about four seconds to realize that we were not going to be sitting down at any point to watch the game there. But that was fine, as I've been to a Dayton-Xavier game in a Dayton bar, and if you don't arrive early enough, you'll be standing all game long as well.
That was where the similarities and familiarities about watching basketball stopped. What followed was unlike anything I've seen before. Every possession, whether it was a turnover, missed shot, made shot, three-pointer, dunk or timeout, was met with a groan or a cheer. When Cody Zeller scored, the bar groaned. When Cody Zeller missed a shot and it was rebounded by Kentucky, the entire bar erupted. If Christian Watford missed a shot and IU grabbed an offensive rebound, a collective groan was guaranteed. When Anthony Davis scored, a bar-wide cheer was assured. Even if a timeout was forced or called after a loose ball, the crowd at Molly Malone's went berserk one way or another. It was unbelievable. So many things that really didn't matter in the grand scheme of the game were met with despair or joy. Hundreds and hundreds of times over, this process continued.
I'm a huge basketball fan. I would say I care about my teams as much as anybody else I've met. But it wasn't even close the amount these people seemed to have invested in their Wildcats. At least in the city of Louisville, the same seemed to go for the Cardinals. This is why I'm concerned about the loss of life possibilities that could result from Louisville and Kentucky's Final Four matchup this weekend. I don't actually see how violence can be avoided. We've all heard about the Dodgers fan being beaten into a coma and two San Francisco 49ers fans being shot after a 49ers-Raiders game. Well, from what I could tell this weekend, the people in Kentucky are at least as insane as the nutjobs involved in those incidents. And this is a Final Four game, compared to a regular season and a preseason game (as in, it's a little bit more important).
Whatever the result of the game, while I had fun in Louisville over the weekend, I'm thinking I'll be glad not to be back in the coming one.
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