The Mecca of College Sports
2/03/2009 | Posted by
Scott Lunn
Surely that title means different things to different people, but there are a few venues in this country that likely stand out more so than others to college sports enthusiasts. College football has Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Indiana, The "Big House" in Ann Arbor, The "Horseshoe" in Columbus, Ohio, and The Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Basketball has it's fair share as well like Rupp Arena in Kentucky, Allen Fieldhouse in Kansas, Pauley Pavilion where UCLA plays, or Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Indiana. A trip to any of these classic buildings is a great experience for a sports fanatic in general, but on the rare occasion you get to go to the one where your favorite team actually plays, it can be downright magical.
As a general rule of thumb on this site, I try to keep my personal bias and fandom at a minimum, it simply makes for better reporting, however, sometimes it doesn't allow for the best story. In 1990, I was 7, going on 8 and just blooming into the full blown sports nut that I've become today. My favorite teams were becoming my own and no longer just my father's, and the lifelong obsessions were only just beginning. At that same time, a kid named Christian Laettner was leading Duke to it's first of 3 consecutive NCAA championship game appearances. Despite being destroyed in that game by an incredible UNLV team, I saw something about their team chemistry and style of play that I really enjoyed. Winning back to back championships in 91 and 92 probably didn't hurt my opinion too much, but my infatuation with Duke basketball had become official, despite living about 700 miles away. Little did I know in my preteen years that I would someday end up making a life for myself significantly closer to the team I'd grown to love.
Fast forward to my mid-20s and I find myself living within 30 miles of the Duke University campus in Durham, North Carolina. Granted, Duke is pretty popular on a national level, and as an elite program, a large portion of their games are broadcasted fairly regularly, but living so close means just about every game is on TV somewhere or another. More importantly, my dream of someday visiting the hallowed grounds of Cameron Indoor Stadium became exponentially more realistic. As a youth, it's not uncommon to day dream about visiting the places where your favorite teams play, and for me, more often than not, Cameron Indoor was it. As I hit my teen years, I attended multiple games at Ralph Wilson Stadium and HSBC Arena, home of the Bills and Sabres respectively. Buffalo wasn't such a long trip and it was always a good time to go be a part of the action in some small way. I always left satisfied with the experience, even after losses, just because being there always meant so much to me, and while those venues will always hold a special place in my heart, they lacked a certain personality. While nice in their own rights, they are both a little on the generic side and don't offer a whole lot of character. Again, my thoughts would often wander down south to Durham. Watching Duke on TV and seeing all those crazy college kids jumping and screaming practically nonstop for an entire game, it just seemed like so much fun.
What I didn't think about during those day dream sessions was just how high in demand those tickets probably were. That reality would strike me quickly upon my arrival to my new home state. After moving here in the summer of 2006, I impatiently waited for basketball season to roll around in the fall, anticipating that my chance to actually attend a Duke game might actually be realized. Imagine my disappointment as the season neared and I began to search out tickets to purchase, only to realize that they were likely going to cost me many times over the price of your typical sporting event. Up until this point, I guess I just hadn't given much thought to just how many people were like me and would like nothing more to go attend a basketball game at this prestigious building. Sensing that neither my budget or penchant for illegal activities were quite high enough to aid me in going to Cameron, I did what I thought was the next best thing.
It just so happens that about a third of the ACC schools all happen to be within an hour of my place of residence, so I managed to secure some slightly over priced tickets to watch Duke play at NC State in the RBC Center. Yes, I just substituted seeing my favorite team play in it's cozy, crazy, little 9,314 seat building with seeing them play in a state of the art, moderately lifeless 18,000+ seat arena. Regardless, step one of my goal had been officially accomplished, I had seen Duke play real life basketball live and in person. It was good, but not good enough, and my efforts would have to increase for the following year.
Thanks to craigslist, overly enthusiastic fandom, and a kind hearted Duke fan, in February of 2008, I accomplished one of my lifelong goals. Much to my delight, it only cost me about $50 too! After weeks of dismay over highly inflated ticket prices had my spirits low again, I unveiled my new plan one Saturday morning. Waking up bright and early on a game day morning, I made a post on the local craigslist page proclaiming my lifelong love for Duke basketball and my ever burning need to finally attend a home game. Somewhere I also managed to throw in that I was relatively broke and couldn't afford the usual ridiculous going rates, but perhaps, maybe, just maybe, there was some fan out there kind enough to help out a fellow wannabe Cameron Crazy. Imagine my pure delight when a few hours later I had just such a response. Somebody had a spare ticket and simply wanted their money back for it, provided it went to a true Duke fan. So several pictures of my tons of fan gear and crude homemade shrines later, an agreement was made for me to meet this person at the stadium before gametime.
Now, for the record, my wedding day currently holds the title for the happiest day of my life, but this day's excitement was within grasping distance (just in case my wife is reading of course!). I'm not sure words can really do justice to how excited I was driving over to Durham, knowing what lied ahead. I parked my car in the first public lot I came across and started marching up the hill towards a building that was nothing less than a shrine in my crazy sports fanatic mind. Approaching the rear of the building, the first thing I spotted was the famed Kryzewskiville. Rows and rows of tents crammed into a small courtyard in front of the building next door where students camped out for days on end in order to have the honor being an official Cameron Crazy. Group after group of people stopped by the sign which indicated that this was in fact the official Kryzewskiville, along with the sign that reads Cameron Indoor Stadium and posed to have their pictures taken... I was not alone, and my pilgrimage was nearly complete.
After standing out front of the building for an agonizing half hour or so, my phone finally rang and my ticket seller would meet me momentarily. After a quick transaction followed by gratuitous thanking on my part, I followed the throng of people through the front door. As the opening tip was only minutes away, a brief disappointment washed over me as I realized I didn't have time to walk around and get a good look, but it disappeared almost as quickly as I walked through my gate and saw 20 years of television become reality right before my eyes. Pure sensory overload kicked in as I tried to take in the literally hundreds of banners hanging from the roof, the court, the student section, and oh yeah, where was my seat again?
Rest assured, I did find my seat and I did watch the game. Now usually, I'm pretty good with the details of any games I happen to attend, it's simply a part of the memories for me when I look back at them later. This time was different however. I can tell you Duke was playing St. John's, and I can tell you that they won pretty handily, but most of the details simply aren't there. Instead I remember a feeling of complete happiness at just being there and taking in the surroundings, regardless of how the game was playing out in front of me. It still amazes me just how small the building really is. My Alma Mater has a 6000 seat arena for it's basketball team, but it's most certainly a larger facility by far than Cameron Indoor Stadium. The seats are literally on top of each other and of course the bleachers get packed full of students, after all, they don't actually need room to sit down anyways. Cameron is truly old school in every sense of the word, and it just wouldn't have the same mystique if it were any other way. The architecture blends in with the rest of the campus, which is quite beautiful by the way, assuming you have any sort if interest in that sort of thing. Looking at it from the outside, a basketball arena would be pretty far down on the list of guesses most people would have for what was contained within.
Again, the details of that actual game are fuzzy at best for me, but the sense of satisfaction at having accomplished something that was a major goal for me is still strong a year later. This past weekend I was lucky enough to go back and attend another game, again through the magic of craigslist and kind hearted fellow Duke fanatics. Much of the original excitement had waned and I certainly remember the game itself much more clearly, a dominant win over Virginia for the record, but it did bring back those feelings I had last year briefly.
I've also had the luxury of just heading over to the campus and wandering around inside the building, looking at all the memories, accomplishments, etc. that can be found all throughout a few times over the course of the last year. I try not to make a habit of it, simply because I fear that excitement will wane too much if becomes a regular thing to me. It was a great feeling to be able to take my younger brother, himself a teenager whose fanaticism is quickly rivaling mine, inside and show him all the greatness contained within. Hopefully, he'll realize his dream of going to a game someday as well.
As I started this article with, the idea of a "Mecca" in the sporting world means different things to different people. You might not care about Cameron Indoor Stadium or the Duke Blue Devils in the least, but you probably have your own personal version of this dream. My advice is to make sure you go at least one time and enjoy that experience. Eventually I got lucky and was able to do this and not spend much money in the process, but in hindsight, the memories and the happiness would easily be worth a larger price tag. So wherever your Mecca is, go there and revel in the excitement, you'll thank me for it later.
As a general rule of thumb on this site, I try to keep my personal bias and fandom at a minimum, it simply makes for better reporting, however, sometimes it doesn't allow for the best story. In 1990, I was 7, going on 8 and just blooming into the full blown sports nut that I've become today. My favorite teams were becoming my own and no longer just my father's, and the lifelong obsessions were only just beginning. At that same time, a kid named Christian Laettner was leading Duke to it's first of 3 consecutive NCAA championship game appearances. Despite being destroyed in that game by an incredible UNLV team, I saw something about their team chemistry and style of play that I really enjoyed. Winning back to back championships in 91 and 92 probably didn't hurt my opinion too much, but my infatuation with Duke basketball had become official, despite living about 700 miles away. Little did I know in my preteen years that I would someday end up making a life for myself significantly closer to the team I'd grown to love.
Fast forward to my mid-20s and I find myself living within 30 miles of the Duke University campus in Durham, North Carolina. Granted, Duke is pretty popular on a national level, and as an elite program, a large portion of their games are broadcasted fairly regularly, but living so close means just about every game is on TV somewhere or another. More importantly, my dream of someday visiting the hallowed grounds of Cameron Indoor Stadium became exponentially more realistic. As a youth, it's not uncommon to day dream about visiting the places where your favorite teams play, and for me, more often than not, Cameron Indoor was it. As I hit my teen years, I attended multiple games at Ralph Wilson Stadium and HSBC Arena, home of the Bills and Sabres respectively. Buffalo wasn't such a long trip and it was always a good time to go be a part of the action in some small way. I always left satisfied with the experience, even after losses, just because being there always meant so much to me, and while those venues will always hold a special place in my heart, they lacked a certain personality. While nice in their own rights, they are both a little on the generic side and don't offer a whole lot of character. Again, my thoughts would often wander down south to Durham. Watching Duke on TV and seeing all those crazy college kids jumping and screaming practically nonstop for an entire game, it just seemed like so much fun. What I didn't think about during those day dream sessions was just how high in demand those tickets probably were. That reality would strike me quickly upon my arrival to my new home state. After moving here in the summer of 2006, I impatiently waited for basketball season to roll around in the fall, anticipating that my chance to actually attend a Duke game might actually be realized. Imagine my disappointment as the season neared and I began to search out tickets to purchase, only to realize that they were likely going to cost me many times over the price of your typical sporting event. Up until this point, I guess I just hadn't given much thought to just how many people were like me and would like nothing more to go attend a basketball game at this prestigious building. Sensing that neither my budget or penchant for illegal activities were quite high enough to aid me in going to Cameron, I did what I thought was the next best thing.
It just so happens that about a third of the ACC schools all happen to be within an hour of my place of residence, so I managed to secure some slightly over priced tickets to watch Duke play at NC State in the RBC Center. Yes, I just substituted seeing my favorite team play in it's cozy, crazy, little 9,314 seat building with seeing them play in a state of the art, moderately lifeless 18,000+ seat arena. Regardless, step one of my goal had been officially accomplished, I had seen Duke play real life basketball live and in person. It was good, but not good enough, and my efforts would have to increase for the following year.
Thanks to craigslist, overly enthusiastic fandom, and a kind hearted Duke fan, in February of 2008, I accomplished one of my lifelong goals. Much to my delight, it only cost me about $50 too! After weeks of dismay over highly inflated ticket prices had my spirits low again, I unveiled my new plan one Saturday morning. Waking up bright and early on a game day morning, I made a post on the local craigslist page proclaiming my lifelong love for Duke basketball and my ever burning need to finally attend a home game. Somewhere I also managed to throw in that I was relatively broke and couldn't afford the usual ridiculous going rates, but perhaps, maybe, just maybe, there was some fan out there kind enough to help out a fellow wannabe Cameron Crazy. Imagine my pure delight when a few hours later I had just such a response. Somebody had a spare ticket and simply wanted their money back for it, provided it went to a true Duke fan. So several pictures of my tons of fan gear and crude homemade shrines later, an agreement was made for me to meet this person at the stadium before gametime. Now, for the record, my wedding day currently holds the title for the happiest day of my life, but this day's excitement was within grasping distance (just in case my wife is reading of course!). I'm not sure words can really do justice to how excited I was driving over to Durham, knowing what lied ahead. I parked my car in the first public lot I came across and started marching up the hill towards a building that was nothing less than a shrine in my crazy sports fanatic mind. Approaching the rear of the building, the first thing I spotted was the famed Kryzewskiville. Rows and rows of tents crammed into a small courtyard in front of the building next door where students camped out for days on end in order to have the honor being an official Cameron Crazy. Group after group of people stopped by the sign which indicated that this was in fact the official Kryzewskiville, along with the sign that reads Cameron Indoor Stadium and posed to have their pictures taken... I was not alone, and my pilgrimage was nearly complete.
After standing out front of the building for an agonizing half hour or so, my phone finally rang and my ticket seller would meet me momentarily. After a quick transaction followed by gratuitous thanking on my part, I followed the throng of people through the front door. As the opening tip was only minutes away, a brief disappointment washed over me as I realized I didn't have time to walk around and get a good look, but it disappeared almost as quickly as I walked through my gate and saw 20 years of television become reality right before my eyes. Pure sensory overload kicked in as I tried to take in the literally hundreds of banners hanging from the roof, the court, the student section, and oh yeah, where was my seat again?
Rest assured, I did find my seat and I did watch the game. Now usually, I'm pretty good with the details of any games I happen to attend, it's simply a part of the memories for me when I look back at them later. This time was different however. I can tell you Duke was playing St. John's, and I can tell you that they won pretty handily, but most of the details simply aren't there. Instead I remember a feeling of complete happiness at just being there and taking in the surroundings, regardless of how the game was playing out in front of me. It still amazes me just how small the building really is. My Alma Mater has a 6000 seat arena for it's basketball team, but it's most certainly a larger facility by far than Cameron Indoor Stadium. The seats are literally on top of each other and of course the bleachers get packed full of students, after all, they don't actually need room to sit down anyways. Cameron is truly old school in every sense of the word, and it just wouldn't have the same mystique if it were any other way. The architecture blends in with the rest of the campus, which is quite beautiful by the way, assuming you have any sort if interest in that sort of thing. Looking at it from the outside, a basketball arena would be pretty far down on the list of guesses most people would have for what was contained within.
Again, the details of that actual game are fuzzy at best for me, but the sense of satisfaction at having accomplished something that was a major goal for me is still strong a year later. This past weekend I was lucky enough to go back and attend another game, again through the magic of craigslist and kind hearted fellow Duke fanatics. Much of the original excitement had waned and I certainly remember the game itself much more clearly, a dominant win over Virginia for the record, but it did bring back those feelings I had last year briefly.I've also had the luxury of just heading over to the campus and wandering around inside the building, looking at all the memories, accomplishments, etc. that can be found all throughout a few times over the course of the last year. I try not to make a habit of it, simply because I fear that excitement will wane too much if becomes a regular thing to me. It was a great feeling to be able to take my younger brother, himself a teenager whose fanaticism is quickly rivaling mine, inside and show him all the greatness contained within. Hopefully, he'll realize his dream of going to a game someday as well.
As I started this article with, the idea of a "Mecca" in the sporting world means different things to different people. You might not care about Cameron Indoor Stadium or the Duke Blue Devils in the least, but you probably have your own personal version of this dream. My advice is to make sure you go at least one time and enjoy that experience. Eventually I got lucky and was able to do this and not spend much money in the process, but in hindsight, the memories and the happiness would easily be worth a larger price tag. So wherever your Mecca is, go there and revel in the excitement, you'll thank me for it later.
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