Enter San Man: Stormin’ the College World Series

Bill San Antonio

I found myself doing some brief comparing and contrasting this weekend.

I attended the National Championship Series between Texas and LSU to decide the winner of the 2009 College World Series, and I wanted to find out whose fans were crazier. I wanted to know who wanted it more.

The quick, instantaneous, almost knee-jerk reaction answer is, without question, LSU. All it took was one look into the crowd of 23,000-plus every night at Rosenblatt Stadium at the sight of a giant sea of purple and yellow to figure that out. But if that’s not enough to convince you, instead try the chants of “Geaux Tigers!” and the tossing of Mardi Gras beads into the mobs of crazed fans each time LSU scored a run.

Texas’ fans did their best to counter these acts of fanhood by chanting “Fight! Texas!” and throwing up a rock hand (the pointer and pinkie in the air while the thumb holds the two inside fingers), a gesture resembling the Longhorn mascot.

I drew the line at the beads. I wanted a string, but because I went as a “Texas fan,” the Tiger faithful wanted nothing to do with me.

But here’s where the contrast comes into play. Despite the Texas cap, St. John’s wasn’t far from my mind on this ‘vacation.’ Trying to see if anyone west of the Mississippi River had ever heard of St. John’s, I wore the school’s t-shirts in hopes of some signs of recognition.

A few Kansas fans had heard of St. John’s, if only because the Johnnies plucked one of their best recruiters, Norm Roberts, and made him their men’s basketball coach. Everyone else (and not many at that) could only pinpoint a tradition of solid basketball during the 1980’s led by a man wearing funny sweaters who had an even funnier last name, but not one they could remember.

They don’t recall the electrifying atmosphere at Madison Square Garden, they don’t remember Chris Mullin or Mark Jackson, and they have no idea what kind of tailspin the program is in now.

It’s funny they recall memories of the Red Storm in terms of ‘tradition,’ particularly because the two teams at the College World Series were two of the most storied baseball programs in NCAA Division I history. The atmosphere in Omaha, NE was so intense, the fan pride was so strong, that a college baseball game felt like a college football game, providing quite a shock to the fans I chatted with.

Nonetheless, fans young and old of both Texas and LSU trekked to Omaha for the two-week College World Series. I’d like to say Red Storm fans – of any sport – would do the same if St. John’s had a shot at postseason glory.

But I can’t.

Not when I see Carnesecca Arena half-empty on gamenight. Not when I see Marquette fans flocking from the Midwest to Madison Square Garden, St. John’s home away from Queens, and outnumbering the Red Storm fans two, three, and four-fold at this year’s Big East tournament, then reveling in the Golden Eagles’ dominant performance against the Johnnies. And certainly not when I see all of fifty people show up for a WNIT game against Boston College and get outcheered at their home court by three Eagles fans who may or may not have had too much to drink that night.

I’ll admit I’m a pretty apathetic Red Storm fan myself, but my byline generally provides a good enough excuse for that.

What makes me sick, though, is total athletic apathy by non-sportswriters at this University. I may not be a fan, but I am still a student at St. John’s, one who takes a great deal of pride in his school.

And I hate to say it, but what I’ve seen from Red Storm fans after only one year of following the school’s athletic programs is an embarrassment to the athletes and coaches who work and compete so hard. It’s an embarrassment to the alumni who helped build that ‘tradition’ in the 1980’s. And it’s an embarrassment to the coach with the funny sweaters and funnier last name.

And in most cases, that apathy starts with that man who left Kansas.

Listen, I know many of you don’t particularly like Norm Roberts, and with his track record in Queens, I honestly don’t blame you.  I can even understand the booing and pessimism that has plagued the team in recent years, and why you are a little afraid to show up at the arena at all.

But restoring the men’s basketball program – or any of St. John’s athletics mojo, for that matter – is as much about building the energy and atmosphere as it is putting an electrifying team on the floor.

They need your help in building that tradition, any tradition, so that St. John’s is relevant once again to the country at large.

Lou Carnesecca isn’t going back to the sidelines; he told me so himself. He also told me that all the great programs go through rough patches.

So lose the sense of entitlement that demands a top-shelf program all the time, and why don’t you start throwing some Mardi Gras beads instead?