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LOGAN - I admit it, I mocked the College Insider.com Tournament championship game between Utah State and Mercer on Wednesday night.
I wasn't alone.
As I wondered around the Spectrum in Logan before tipoff, I had many conversations with Aggie fans and media that ended in jokes about this tournament and title game.
The jokes were not very funny, just full of sarcasm. My favorite was, "If Utah State wins will they hold a banner raising ceremony before the first game next season to celebrate a national title?"
When I asked a student if he considered this a ‘national title' game he quipped, "Yes it's all we've got right now."
I could recite a few more sarcastic remarks but they really aren't that funny. They were ‘you had to be there' kind of jokes.
Well, all of those jokes turned into excitement and energy in the final 10 minutes of the game when the Aggies made a comeback and took a 6 point lead. Adults, former college athletes and kids wearing Aggie blue shirts were jumping out of their seats and cheering on their team as hard and loud as if this were the NCAA title game. And all of a sudden, the sarcasm stopped. This was no longer a joke.
The Aggies didn't win and even though the Spectrum wasn't sold out, the crowd got its money's worth. On the court, the Aggies were able to give their underclassmen an extra three weeks of practice - full, real, hard middle of the season practice without ever leaving Logan to play a game on the road.
Head Coach Stew Morrill knows how invaluable that will be for the future. He talked about sophomore Danny Berger improving over those three extra weeks. Berger averaged 6.6 points per game during the season, but on Wednesday night he scored 15 and looked like a legitimate second option to the sharp shooting sophomore Preston Medlin. Berger said after the game that "whenever you play you play to win, that's what a competitor does."
Junior Kysean Reed will be relied on heavily next season as the man in the middle. In the extra three weeks of practice, five extra games, Reed became more dominate in the middle, averaging two more points a game in the post season than he did in the regular season, including 15 points and seven rebounds in the title game.
It started out as a joke and then turned into the usual loud Spectrum crowd cheering for their Aggies.
The extra three weeks of practice and extra five games in a do or die situation will undoubtedly help the players improve so they can give their fans even more to cheer about in the future.
