Charging UK students to attend the JV basketball games is ridiculous

Chris Easterling
Assistant Sports Editor

A few random observations as basketball season begins to get in full-swing:

I understand UK basketball is big, and that the athletic department makes a lot of money off of it. But please. Making the students pay $2 to attend a junior varsity game is a little ridiculous. The students don't even have to pay to attend varsity women's game. Why should they have to pay to get into see junior varsity basketball?

Now I'm not trying to put down the guys who play on the team, they are giving everything they can to impress the coaching staff and get playing time. Heck, I only wish I could play basketball at UK, even at the junior varsity level. But why?

Who knows, maybe next start charging students to attend cross country meets?

Last Saturday, Duke suffered its first non-conference loss at Cameron Indoor Stadium since Louisville beat them in January of 1983, a string of 95 games. Cameron is arguably the toughest arena to play in because of the sheer enthusiasm that Duke students show throughout the game, hence the nickname "Cameron Crazies."

Now if UK fans could give Rupp Arena that same type of atmosphere, the Cats would have the biggest home-court advantage in the country. It's not that Cat fans don't make a lot of noise during the big games, such as U of L or Arkansas, but it does not even come close to the mayhem that reigns at Cameron for any game, be it North Carolina or Towson State.

For all I care, Kansas can have the number one ranking in December. As long as UK can have the national championship in April.

After suffering through two seasons of fashion abuse, it's good to see the Cats attired much more conservatively, but speaking of fashion, could someone please explain why Rick Pitino was wearing that tie he wore against Massachusetts. It had to be the ugliest thing I've ever seen. I'll chalk it up to a bad tie-day, or maybe it was a gift. C'mon Armani man, sport the good stuff.

It appears Bernadette Locke-Mattox has the women's basketball team heading in the right direction. Maybe some of Pitino's magic rubbed off on her and she can turn this program around much like Pitino did when he arrived in Lexington.

It would be great publicity for the Southeastern Conference if Florida's football team could knock off Nebraska in the Fiesta Bowl on Jan. 2 to win the national championship. Then to top it off UK could run the table in the NCAA Tournament in March to win the basketball title.

With the SEC also having at least three or four women's basketball teams ranked highly by the polls, there is a possibility the conference could become one of the first, if not the first, to have three national champs in the same season. Throw in UK gymnast Jenny Hansen, already a three-time national champ, and the SEC is looking at a big year in national competition.

Derek Anderson was ranked heading into the 1991-92 season as the 16th best high school player in the state of Kentucky. Ranked ahead of him, U of L's Jason Osborne and Tick Rogers.

Shows you how much the so-called experts know.

I, for one, was disappointed that Indiana's coach Bob Knight had skipped his postgame news conference after UK beat his Hoosiers on Saturday.

I was looking forward to hearing a expletive-filled tirade much like the one he had after IU was knocked out in the first round of last year's NCAA Tourney by Missouri.

I wonder if former Arkansas star and UK heartbreaker Scotty Thurman would have gotten an agent last year if had known he would be unemployed in December.

Assistant Sports Editor Chris Easterling is a journalism freshman.