This is Indiana.
Where we apparently don’t care about professional basketball.
If you are from Indiana like I am, you know there is very little we take more seriously and keep close to our heart than basketball.
Hoops may not have been born here, but it is where the game is played and followed with an unbridled passion, one that others (like New York, Chicago, Kansas and North Carolina) imitate but can never duplicate.
We are Hoosiers. We are “I love you guys.” We are the Milan Miracles, Bobby Plump, Hinkle Fieldhouse, IU, Purdue, red sweaters, Bobby Knight, comb-overs, Gene Keady, thrown chairs and Digger Phelps.
We are Chrysler Fieldhouse, where Wooden was born and raised, The Wigwam, Big O, The Undefeated Season of ’76 and “The Shot.” We are The Big Dog, Damon Bailey and Steve Alford.
We are Larry Bird. We are Slick Leonard. We are “Boom Baby”. We are 8-points in 9 seconds and a choke sign to Spike Lee in Madison Square Garden. We are still engaged in a 15-year battle over single-class basketball.
Basketball is who we are. Or maybe it was who we were.
This is Indiana (no, really, this is Indiana).
And right now, this is kind of pathetic.
Our numbers are dropping in high school basketball attendance. You can blame class basketball, but then again, you can’t. We’re kind of excited about the revival of Indiana University under Tom Crean, but they just locked up a stellar recruiting class and the only way I heard about it was through IU fans on Facebook. If this were 1992, people wouldn’t shut up about it.
And Purdue fans – is there such a thing right now? – are as quiet as a field mouse. Purdue and Indiana used to not only matter nationally, but they were what this state thought about most. Butler made the NCAA title game two straight seasons – the second time without sensation and Brownsburg native Gordon Hayward – and people were excited for about 10 minutes.
Speaking of Hayward, have we forgotten about this kid? You know, the one that hit a crazy game winner in the 4A state championship game, then led Butler to the title game his sophomore year and now is an outstanding young NBA player for the Utah Jazz? Where’s his book? Where’s his cult following? He did what Bailey and Alford couldn’t do – stand out in the NBA – and I don’t see anyone under 15 wearing his jersey to school.
What the hell happened to us? What happened to rusty rims hanging from barns, dirt courts and old men in coffee shops? My parents (IU fans) and their best friends (Purdue fans) couldn’t even watch games together because they were afraid of what they might say. Now? Purdue and IU rarely come up in conversation. What the hell is wrong with us? We’re dying a painful basketball death here in Hoops Holy Land and everyone seems to be shrugging their shoulders.
The biggest case in point: the Indiana Pacers.
After years of complaining (including from me) about the dynamics of the team, how they (or RonMetta WorldTestapeace) ruined the great shot they had in 2004, the strip club shootings, the gun charges, well, they at least have been getting it right lately.
After giving the Chicago Bulls all they could handle as a spunky 8-seed in last year’s playoffs, the Pacers secured the 3-seed this year, clearly their best regular season in nearly a decade. They are young, fun, filled with talented players who work together as a team. They feature a hometown kid, George Hill, and have likeable players and hard workers all over the roster. They are ran by Larry Bird. This is the quintessential “Indiana” basketball team – fun, likeable, fundamental, hard working.
And they had the second-worst attendance in the NBA this season. Frankly, the Pacers attendance has been in the dregs of the league for over 10 years.
This is not about a small market. We fill up Lucas Oil Stadium just fine – even during a 2-14 season.
Win or lose, we just don’t come to Consec…er, Bankers Life Fieldhouse.
I could go on and on about how great it is in the Fieldhouse, what a value it is (and I’ve done that in previous columns over the years), but we’re just not listening. We just don’t care. And that, my friends, is what scares me the most.
The Pacers are about to take on the Miami Heat in Round 2 – an epic affair and what could prove to be the best series in the Eastern Conference and we’re acting like it’s a kindergarten soccer tournament. We’re losing our identity. Or as R.E.M. once said, we’re losing our religion.
I know there are so many things different about 2012 than there were about the 1980s and 1990s; our options are far greater. The Pacers are not the only “game in town” when it comes to entertainment and sporting options anymore. We’re a busy lot, with much to do and places to go. And that’s fine, really. It’s a sign of the times.
Now we could dissect how it’s easier to go to eight Colts home games than 20 or so Pacers games. But the cost is probably the same. And yes, it’s an expensive night out for a beer and a hot dog, but you tell me what isn’t expensive these days.
Just tell me what’s happening to us? Was it truly the Malice at the Palace? Was it a loss of trust? General disinterest? Are we know a football town? A football state? I can’t believe it. I know Peyton Manning was here, orchestrating one of the greatest runs in NFL history – but football and basketball season collide for but a brief few months.
Maybe we’re just not cut out for the NBA here. Even when the Pacers were rolling in the 1990s, it was nothing like the Colts “Blue Fridays” at workplaces around central Indiana. Maybe it’s the length of the season. Or for some reason the dichotomy of how NBA players are perceived by our Midwestern culture. Maybe it’s because college basketball has always mattered here more than professional basketball and people only have enough energy to fully engage in one team.
Yet, really, none of this matters. These “reasons” and excuses are just that – reasons and excuses. They don’t speak to the heart of the matter – that this is Indiana. Basketball is in our blood. We live and breathe it.
Or at least we used to.
We are in danger of losing this team one day, sure. (And it will be oddly amusing when people who never went to games begin to complain.) But more important, we’re in danger of losing our essence, our character and our culture if we don’t snap out of this basketball funk we’ve been in.
This is Indiana.
And if we’re not careful, they’ll be talking about how we once balled.
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