COMMENTARY: Flames go down fighting

UIC NOT IN AWE IN 3RD NCAA TOURNEY APPEARANCE

(3/19/04)

KANSAS CITY—Fifth-year senior Jabari Harris sat in the corner of UIC’s locker room with a hint of tears in his eyes, resigned to the fact that the Flames’ season and his career was over.

Just before the media horde descending upon them, one could hear a pin drop on the locker room floor.

The team felt despondent after the Flames’ 78-53 loss to Kansas, but UIC coach Jimmy Collins put the NCAA tournament loss in perspective to his team.

“I told them that there are a whole bunch of teams sitting on their couches,” said Collins (pictured). “watching TV, wishing they were here.”

The effort was there, albeit sometimes sloppy. UIC was not in awe of the mighty Jayhawks or the mostly partisan crowd at Kemper Arena Friday night.

Even 30 minutes before the game, Jayhawks fans that had arrived early spotted the Flames players, who had been watching the second half of the Pacific-Providence game, leaving the stands to prepare for Kansas. They spewed their venom at the Flames in the form of loud boos.

“I try to take the fans’ energy, their boos, and turn it around and use it for my energy,” said Williams, who simply applauded when the Jayhawks’ faithful booed in unison.

From the point of the bracket announcements a week ago, UIC was confident in themselves and gave themselves a chance to knock off the boys from Lawrence, Kan.

“I see this as an upset game,” Williams said at UIC’s Selection Sunday party. “It’s going to be a big crowd. I love it. Our confidence is going up. We won’t let the crowd and the hype get to us. They’re human guys like us.”

Guard Cedrick Banks commented that UIC “could win if we play our game.”

Somehow, some folks on the internet saw that as an uncalled-for act of bravado on the part of the Flames. Some of these people, who use “handles” and nicknames, said it was a sign of disrespect for the mighty Jayhawks. One fan even called Banks a “loudmouth.”

Okay, then. So, maybe the Flames should have bowed down to Kansas and paid their proper respect.

That’s the stuff of losers—the type of defeatist attitude a team has when it knows it has no chance to win.

While the Flames’ performance against Kansas did not resemble anything like a championship team’s performance, their effort and their guts were championship-caliber.

When Williams prevented Keith Langford from scoring on an easy layup with a hard foul, it was looked upon as an unpardonable sin—and it was called an intentional foul by official Olandis Poole. Television replays show Langford trying to adjust his body in mid-air to avoid his shot from being blocked and Williams hacked his shoulder instead of the basketball.

“We felt that Langford was trying to maneuver the ball around Armond,” UIC’s Martell Bailey said.

“I didn’t try to intentionally hurt anyone,” added Williams (pictured). “The ref called it a hard foul, but I kept my comments to myself. Langford told me he was all right.”

Of course, a Kansas City Star reporter, apparently with his Jayhawks’ sunglasses on, had the gall to say the Flames were playing dirty.

“Clearly frustrated, the Flames started getting a little dirty,” he wrote. “[Wayne] Simien was twice pushed in the back on layup attempts. And Illinois-Chicago’s Armond Williams was called for a flagrant foul on Langford.”

But let’s not mention the fact that David Padgett (accidentally) ran over Martell Bailey on a fast break, seconds before Kansas got a three-point play.

Of course, the message board people got on the bandwagon and started calling UIC a “bunch of thugs.”

Watch a little of bit of Horizon League basketball and you’ll see teams like Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Butler and Detroit play the same way—hard-nosed and physical. That probably has something to do with the reason that those teams along with UIC have become perennial winners in recent years—and the reason why teams like Kansas won’t dare play them on the road.

(***Tangent alert: The “intentional” was horrible call. Basically, the free throws plus possession and the subsequent three-pointer by J.R. Giddens basically put the game out of reach. The call basically took away the last bit of steam from the Flames.)

The game was physical, okay? Both teams admitted as much.

“The game was physical, but it was physical because it is the NCAA,” Kansas guard Aaron Miles said. “There are two teams competing and only one can win, so it’s supposed to be physical.”

“I don’t believe Armond would hurt anyone,” Banks added. “We wouldn’t do anything like that. We just try to play good, hard basketball.”

One thing UIC fans should be proud of is that even when the walk-ons and rarely-used reserves were in the game, they would not give up easy baskets in the half-court game. Even sophomore walk-on Etienne Nelson recorded a foul trying to stop an easy basket.

There are reasons why UIC won 24 ballgames this year—they're called determination and fight.

Expect more determination and fight next year, and with that maybe the season-ending tears will come much later.