Adams: Fans don't make the cut for SEC tournament

Photo by AP Photo / Dave Martin

Southeastern Conference officials prepare the Alexander Memorial Coliseum on the campus of Georgia Tech University for the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament in Atlanta Saturday, March 15, 2008. The SEC tournament games were moved to the campus of Georgia Tech after high winds damaged the Georgia Dome on Friday night.

ATLANTA — My first take on the tornado-wrecked SEC basketball tournament: no fans, no tournament.

But that option was never discussed, SEC associate commissioner Charles Bloom said late Saturday morning as the Alexander Memorial Coliseum began coming to life.

Rather than cancel the tournament, the SEC decided to move it from the Georgia Dome to the coliseum on the Georgia Tech campus. The Georgia Dome was damaged by a tornado that passed through downtown Atlanta on Friday night.

Most fans didn’t make the cut. Who did make the cut wasn’t crystal clear.

The first official word: Unless fans were on a player’s pass list — which was designated before the tournament — or a member of the school’s “official party,” they couldn’t watch Saturday’s three tournament games, which began with a second-round noon game between Kentucky and Georgia.

The official word changed later in the day. Bloom said each of the five remaining schools had 400 tickets to disseminate among their fans. He said he wasn’t aware of that earlier in the day.

Aside from those select fans, only team pep bands and cheerleaders, media and school officials were supposedly allowed in the coliseum.

Bloom said the decision was made about 4 a.m. Saturday, hours after Friday’s Georgia-Kentucky game was postponed. The athletic directors from the schools involved — Tennessee, Kentucky, Georgia, Mississippi State and Arkansas — reached a consensus, Bloom said.

SEC commissioner Mike Slive, who is in Indianapolis as a member of the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee, took part in the discussion by phone.

Incoming weather was a huge factor in the decision to change venues. Another storm cell was scheduled to move through Atlanta early Saturday afternoon.

Although there was no evidence of structural damage to the Georgia Dome, there was plenty of evidence this wasn’t just another basketball tournament. The winds knocked holes in one section of the Georgia Dome roof, and the falling debris included nuts and bolts.

The decision to resume the tournament Saturday forced Georgia, a 60-56 winner over Kentucky, to play two games in one day. Bloom said both schools were OK with that.

Georgia had the most to lose by not playing. The Bulldogs’ only hope of qualifying for the NCAA tournament was to win the SEC tournament and secure the conference’s automatic bid to college basketball’s biggest show.

Based on the fan turnout, you would have concluded the game meant more to Kentucky. Either that, or Georgia fans had no idea they had access to tickets.

By tip-off, there were fewer than 100 fans in Georgia colors in the coliseum. Kentucky fans outnumbered them 4- or 5-to-1. Said former Auburn basketball coach Sonny Smith: “I know they’re known for horse breeding in Kentucky, but I didn’t think they could come up with this many (players’) family members in 24 hours.”

The fan ratio didn’t look that much different from so many other SEC tournament games featuring the Wildcats and their large, passionate following.

Kentucky fans also dominated the late-night crowd Friday in the Georgia Dome. Their team was originally scheduled to play Georgia in the final of the four second-round games.

Susan Lax, a University of Kentucky publicist, said her school’s contingent numbered 400. That included fans who had tickets through Kentucky state legislators and the school president’s office. Each player got six tickets to the tournament, and coaches also had tickets for their families.

Some Kentucky fans apparently were more creative in finding access to the coliseum. Lax said she saw fans jumping a fence, which enabled them to circumvent security outside the coliseum.

One Kentucky fan said a “ticket broker” gave him eight tickets outside the arena and said, “Don’t tell anybody where you got them.”

Other fans said they were allowed into the coliseum because their Georgia Dome tickets were in “a certain section.”

Tickets became a premium Friday night when a sudden storm caught everyone by surprise. Anyone in the Georgia Dome felt the full brunt of the surprising weather development.

Mississippi State and Alabama were in the midst of overtime when the storm hit.

Alabama’s Mykal Riley said Mississippi State player Ben Hansbrough turned to him and said, “Was that a tornado?”

“I agreed,” Riley said.

Not only did you have the sound of a proverbial freight train roaring through the Georgia Dome, you could see the girders near the roof begin to sway.

Officials stopped the game, fans were told to stay inside, and most players made their way to their locker rooms. But Hansbrough went into the stands.

“I was concerned about my dad,” Hansbrough said. “He had surgery recently and can’t move that well. I was going to carry him out of there if I had to.”

While players waited for the game to resume, they called their parents and reflected on what had just happened.

Riley was asked about the significance of his buzzer-beating 3-pointer that sent the game into overtime. If he had missed, the game would have ended in regulation time, and fans might have been outside when the tornado hit.

He could have hit a lifesaving shot.

“We were talking about that in the locker room,” said Riley, who added he was just grateful that no one in the Georgia Dome was injured. “It was scary.”

Mississippi State senior Charles Rhodes, who is arguably the best player quote in the SEC, was asked if he had ever experienced anything like this during a basketball game.

“Bats got in the gym when I was in high school,” Rhodes said. “They had to delay the game until they got the two bats out of there.

“But this tops that.”

Sports editor John Adams may be reached at 865-342-6284 or adamsj@knews.com.

Sports editor John Adams may be reached at 865-342-6284 or adamsj@knews.com.

© 2008, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.
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