From The Classroom: A Night On The Town At The Navy B-Ball Game

Welcome to my first Night on the Town column, where I attend various events in Annapolis and review them specifically for teens, so they know whether or not they should go (and for parents, so they know whether or not they’re dragging their teen along to something that is the equivalent of having their eyes gouged out with a protractor). Hopefully, in the future, I will be publishing more of these, if somehow the demons of homework/irresistible attraction to bed & computer/no social life fall down and die all at one time and allow me to venture out into the world.

In this column, I’ll be writing about my experience at the Navy basketball game I attended a few weeks back, over Thanksgiving break.

I’d like to start off by saying I’m not a die-hard Navy fan–nothing beyond the bit of obligatory hometown loyalty, at least–and I’m reviewing this as just another basketball game. Dedicated Navy fans can bump up my ratings as needed to suit.

The game was relatively cheap–average Joes can attend for eight bucks a pop, little kids for less. This left me a bit wary–after all, you get what you pay for, and my experience with what you can buy with $8 (tickets to that ridiculous movie Jumper, crappy steak) made me a little uneasy. But in the end, $8 isn’t too heart-wrenching to part with for a night out, especially with the economy the way it is.

The crowd totaled over a thousand–which sounds like a good number, but keep in mind that the arena could seat 5,000. It looked emptier than a Spencer Pratt fan club meeting.

And I know this is the same at all other sports venues, but I really need to gripe about the seats.

Really, Navy? Is this your way of getting people to stand up and cheer–making their seats feel like stone? You try being entertained while sitting on hard, uncomfortable plastic. We have seats just like that in Geometry class, and the entertainment value of Geometry class is nil. Most school auditoriums have padded seats, and sports teams make exponentially more than schools do.

My rant about seating is done. Of course, the seats would be no better at your average Ravens’ game, so don’t skip this game just because of that. I included the rant in the hopes that the Gods of Sports Venue Seating were listening.

The game itself was pretty good. Navy is a talented team, that’s for sure, and it’s fun to watch the players with their catlike reflexes and coordinated team plays (much more fun than watching a bunch of disorganized sixth-graders, as I did while warming the bench for my sixth-grade basketball team). The Towson Tigers had one or two good players as well, and there were points where they kept the game close, but Navy always pulled ahead (and eventually ended up winning, I believe by 14 points). The passing, the shooting, the blocking, the stealing, all of it was fun to watch and happening so quick–the quality of the playing was very good, especially when you consider that it cost a fraction of pro game ticket prices.

Of course, the game isn’t the only thing there to see. During long stretches of people passing back and forth under the basket, my attention would gravitate towards the fat men yelling at the players from the sideline. It was quite a comical sight.

Then, of course, there were the timeouts–and when the timeouts happened, the Navy cheerleaders came out. The Navy cheerleading team is not like the Navy marching band (which played a few numbers in the stands–very well, I might add) –after all, these women are being trained to kill people. Giving them pom-poms and telling them to smile and cheer is like telling a vampire to become a vegetarian. The three male cheerleaders were the bright spots of the laughable squad as they turned backflip upon backflip over the court–much better than the females, who were doing jumping jacks and waving their pom-poms woodenly, in perfect non-unison.

There were a lot of gimmicks I thought took away from the game itself–the advertisements shown on the big screen, the flashing lights that commanded you to ‘make some noise’, and the marching band waving noodles and yelling to distract the Tigers from making free throws.

“What is this stuff?” asked my dad, who grew up during the era of peach-basket hoops. “We never had this stuff when I played.”

Well, yes, Dad. But remember, when you were playing, FDR was in the oval office smoking cigarettes in his ivory holder, and African-Americans weren’t allowed in restaurants. Now Barack Obama is the president, and people who smoke aren’t allowed in restaurants. Times have changed drastically.

Even though the boring cheerleaders and cheesy promotions turned off some teens and parents, the kids were enthralled. My little brother would jump up, eyes wide, and fight like a madman whenever the cheerleaders threw rubber Navy basketballs into the audience. He dutifully stood up and screamed when the board instructed him to make some noise. For someone who had never been to a Navy game in his life, he threw himself into it with a passion, screaming MAKE IT! or DON’T MAKE IT! during free throws (depending, of course, on which team was shooting). This was true for all the kids–the only people captured on the ‘dance cam’ would be kids who gleefully writhed around, and the loudest noises came from excited children.

Navy b-ball games are great for kids and navy fans; beyond that, their effect is no different than a night spent at home playing video games.

Well, what did YOU expect for eight dollars? (get your tickets here)

Later,

Tags: Navy, Navy Basketball, Night On The Town, seth perry, USNA

Category: COLUMNS, From The Classroom