WBB: American Southwest Conference

[thejungle]

This whole thing boils down to a single word:  Consideration.

Both McMurry and HSU are more than considerate when it comes to hospitality for visiting teams.

At McMurry...FORTY percent of the arena is marked off for Howard Payne or HSU.  TWENTY percent for other teams who bring in a far smaller visiting crowd.  Ropes are used to designate visitors seating, and security is actually there to help with seating.  Finally, the seats provided for visitors ARE JUST AS GOOD as those provided for home.  The same is true at HSU.

Howard Payne is a different story.  Nothing was roped off for fans.  (At least not that my wife and I could find.)  And ALL of the good seats were saved for Howard Payne only.

What ended up happening was this:  I couldn't find a good seat in the predominantly McMurry section, so my wife and I ended up sitting in a section dominated by HPU fans...But there were at least 10 or 15 McMurry fans in our section.  We were a bit subdued because we couldn't be ourselves.

That's all you SHOULD do HPU.  You SHOULD allow plenty of good seats for the visitors so they can sit with their fellow fans.  You didn't do that.  In my opinion it was taking home court advantage a BIT too far.

One final point:  I ended up sitting with an ex-HPU player.  She played three years ago.  I recognized her immediately.  She said this:  HPU has tremendous home court advantage because they play everyday on that crappy floor.  They know exactly where the ball doesn't bounce right on that nasty plywood.  They must have also developed bat-like eyes to see in the dark as well playing day in and day out.  A warning to whoever ends up playing HPU on Saturday.  That facility has some SERIOUS issues!

[fanstand]

I wasn't going to bring it up again, but it was early Saturday that the paper was gone. Didn't even bother on Sunday.  And we had a lot of fans, dballa there were not 3,500 people rooting for HPU on Sunday. Nice inflation of numbers.  And we could have won that game, but for a couple of easy shots missed, and a little more a the free throw line.  We beat ourselves. Funny how, your double teams never sent us to the line, but anything at the other end was a shooting foul. I'm not making excuses, we beat ourselves, we are also a GREAT team. No doubt, I say we go deep no matter where we travel............. LIB, moves on, that's all that matters.

[mcmfan]

In justice to HPU, some of this may just be inexperience with large crowds.  A friend from church who is an Ozarks alumnus said that there was no special reserved space for the Ozarks team bus, so it had to park wherever it could find a place and then got hemmed in by all the cars so it had trouble leaving afterwards.  And a few weeks ago when I tried to find the address to the Brownwood Colosseum, I went to the HPU page and under "facilities" there were photographs but no address (which is still the case of you go to http://www.hputx.edu/howardpayne.aspx?pgID=1596).  On the other hand, HPU put up a great page for the tournament, with a nice map.  I think you want a quality operation to go along with a quality team, and there are still some rough edges getting there.

[hpfan]

To MCMFAN: you might want to check out your own website before criticizing someone else.  There are really nice pictures of Kimbrell, but no map. http://www.mcm.edu/athletics/wbasketball/kimbrell.html

To thejungle: Do you really want to talk about someone being inconsiderate.  What about a coach who sends his assistant to shake the hands of the players from the other team like every other coach in the division, as to say he is too good to shake the hands of the opposing players.

To: fanstand: I agree that MCM has a great team, and I also agree that the refs were not the best at the game yesterday, but they were equally as bad at both ends of the court.  MCM did not loose due to the refs.  And you should have put more emphasis on COULD have won.  You did not beat yourself, HPU won the game.  Both teams are great teams and deserved to be in the championship game.  HPU came out on top though.

[McM93]

Can't we all just get along?  It is playoff time and everything is in the past except for the biggest tournament of the year!!!!!!  Good luck HPU and McM, they WILL represent the ASC well!!!!!!!

[hpfan]

Well put McM93.  Go HPU and McM, do Texas proud!

[thejungle]

Honestly, everyone on this board is now hoping for the best for both HPU and McM.  And YES, we're all focussed on this coming weekend.

BUT, with that said, it IS time for a post-mordem on the Conference Tourney.  And this is the place to do that.  HPU has a lot of be proud of when it comes to the tourney:  It went smoothly, everyone I talked to was very welcoming, and it was a record-breaker for attendence.  But that doesn't mean there aren't things that could be done to make it a better tournament.  And I hope HPU officials had a chance to look at some of these comments, because there are several things HPU could do NEXT TIME to make it an even better experience.

And isn't that the point?

[hpfan]

That is a valid point.  It is good to get feedback to make things better.  The best way to recieve that feedback would be in a constructive manner, rather than being called inconsiderate.  Wouldn't that make a better point?

[mcmfan]

To MCMFAN: you might want to check out your own website before criticizing someone else.  There are really nice pictures of Kimbrell, but no map.

Quite true.  But Kimbrell is on our campus, and can be found on the campus map at http://www.mcm.edu/newsite/web/enrollment/campus_map.html.  The problem with the coliseum is that it's not located on the HPU campus.   The first time I went to a HPU game several years ago, I actually spent an hour wandering around HPU before I figured out that the stadium was somewhere else.

[sethhpu]

I must say there were 3600 people in the coliseum yesterday. Anywhere you went except for the nosebleed seats it was cramped. The atmosphere was great and the refs were bad on both ends. Everybody has just seemed to be dogging HPU and the facilities because they weren't catered to there specific requirements. The toliet paper I understand the gripe, but if the McM fans had come early then they could have had there pick of seats.

[sethhpu]

That is also why they call in home court advantage.

[thejungle]

"Consideration."  I stand by that point.  Because it's nicer than saying "forced home court advantage" or "contempt for the visiting team". 

It really is quite extraordinary for many of us at McM when there wasn't a visitors section.  It's something we don't understand.  We always go out of the way to make sure visitors get a large percentage of VERY GOOD seats.

At HPU it was fend for yourself, and stay out of ANY of the good seats...They were for HPU only.

[sethhpu]

I know for a fact there was two sections one for vistor and one for home team fans reserved behind the benches. Now they weren't a huge amount of seats, but the coliseum has never had reserved seats.

[McM93]

All I know is, is that I enjoyed my experience in Brownwood (besides us losing).  It was a little crowded but what was at stake on the BASKETBALL FLOOR covered all that up.  I understand being comfortable, but the whole reason we were there is to watch what every one of these young ladies have worked so hard for: A CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP!!!!!

I know we lost, but we are still in the "big dance" and have as good a shot at the title as anyone else.

[mcmfan]

As for the officiating, for what it's worth, one of my colleagues has tallied up the attempted free throws from each of the conference games:

                                 HPU    Opponent

HPU vs. Ozarks          21             7
HPU vs. HSU             42            21
HPU vs. McM             32             9