Game ruins seats

Hey fellas, what's cooler than being cool?\nIU's shooting in the second half!\nAs we all know by now, 15 percent is good when you are saving money on your car insurance. When it is your field goal percentage in the second half of the game, it is quite the opposite.\nIllinois and IU combined to put together the most abysmal basketball performance I have seen since high school, if not before then. The Illini won, despite tying their season-low for points scored, the other game being a 19-point loss to Providence.\nMuch like a high school team, the Hoosiers decided to stop scoring after 32 minutes had been played. And to call a timeout and draw up a shot where Bracey Wright was being double-teamed as the potential game winner? And where was Roderick Wilmont all game? \nDude wins the game last week, and he only gets six minutes against Illinois, sitting on the bench while the offense is unable to do anything at all. Why? \nOn a personal level, the fact that Tuesday's game was the only game of the year where my friends and I got to sit courtside added to the high school feel. It was the most I have been into any game all year because being courtside does wonders. You feel that much more a part of the game.\nMy courtside seats actually got me a lot closer to the action than I ever could have anticipated. My friends and I decided that we would show up incognito, so I painted my face red, wore a construction helmet and sported a wig crafted out of a pom-pom. My friend decided to paint his face white and looked like some sort of demented clown. (Not that there is any other variety of clown).\nWhen a lady approached me early in the second half, I assumed that I had done something warranting my removal from the arena and braced for the worst. Instead, she asked, "Would you like to run with one of the flags during the timeout?"\nI know a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity when I see it, albeit not usually until a week or so after it happens. This time, I wasn't going to let it pass me by.\nWhen the eight-minute timeout arrived, so did my one moment of glory. I picked up my red "I" flag and prepared to charge out onto the Assembly Hall floor when I realized that somehow we had managed to spell "Indaina." After a few seconds, I was able to rectify the situation, though I worry the gaffe might somehow have cursed the Hoosiers.\nAfter what seemed like only a few seconds, it was all over. But it is a moment that ranks up with the first time I rode a bike without training wheels as one of my life's all-time finest moments. In fact, it's actually better than my first bike ride because I didn't crash into a tree carrying the flag.\nBut it seems a shame that I, and every one else sitting courtside for this game, won't have another opportunity to do so all season. Surely there must be a way to reward the most avid IU fans with the best seats. And a model used by the University of Maryland might be that system.\nMaryland has a system in which students accumulate points by attending athletic events. So if you show up to watch, say, a volleyball, soccer or field hockey game, you swipe your student ID and get points.\nThose who get more points are rewarded with better seats for basketball. It's a system that works for all involved. Smaller, non-revenue sports get the fan support that they desperately need and deserve. (Or as is the case at IU, big revenue sports like football).\nAnd fans that drank milk out of an IU bottle don't get placed in the last seat of Assembly Hall for the most important game of the year.\nSchools like Illinois have raucous student sections that can affect the outcome of a game. Why should IU strive to be any different?