– Chris Lang
OK. Whatever. I get it Charleston Southern. You’re trying to make your gym sound more menacing. But the Buc Dome? First off, it’s more like the Buc Barn. The CSU Field House, where the Buccaneers and Liberty will do battle tonight, seats about 789, which is slightly more than Campbell and slightly less than E.C. Glass High School. There are five rows of seats behind press row, nine rows of bleachers on the other side of the court, and then there’s the “Buc Wild Zone,” which sits in what appears to be a converted stage behind one of the baskets.
I’ve been in some small gyms before, but having hit both CSU and Campbell in the same year, I think I’ve stumbled on some sort of strange jackpot of low-level college basketball. The only thing worse for CSU is when they play in the North Charleston Coliseum and the same 700 people show up to games there. Cozy indeed.
I used to cover games at Cal State Northridge, which has a junior college gym that they dub “The Matadome.” That’s about the same level of ridiculousness. Or ridiculosity? Is that a word? Probably not.
Fun fact, though, is that they filmed the basketball scenes for National Lampoon’s “Van Wilder” at the Matadome. That movie featured Tek from the Real World Hawaii and also was probably the last time Tara Reid actually looked cute.
Quick thoughts on tonight’s game:
* This really is a huge opportunity for Liberty, one it desperately needs to take advantage of. It was about this time last season that the Flames actually started looking like a decent road team, winning its last two league games at VMI and Radford. Ritchie McKay’s assessment is spot on. I know he sounds a lot like Joe Morgan by bringing up the word consistency a lot, but the Flames have shown little of it in recent weeks. To win back-to-back road games would be a step in the right direction.
* CSU doesn’t have a lot of size to counter Liberty forward Alex McLean. After McLean was limited to nine points Saturday at Coastal, I’d expect him to get plenty of touches tonight.
* The CSU pep band is rocking Kool & The Gang’s “Jungle Boogie.” Great job!
