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Showing content with the highest reputation on 02/23/2019 in all areas

  1. SO, about playing BYU back in the Riverside Invitational in 1984... First, you must understand that playing in that 8-team classic was a big deal back then, as the Cal-Riverside website can attest: The RBI Tournament. It was a huge deal for the Riverside (CA) community, and a big money-maker for the organizers. ORU and BYU were perennial Top-25 teams at the time, but it was still a bit of a surprise when the two private religious schools managed to power their way through the round-robin bracket and into the championship game. Which is where I found the tournament director, a local Chamber of Commerce-type who was only interested in the bottom line, glumly sitting with chin in hands in the press box late in that title game. He took a glance at my ORU logo shirt, scoffed disgustedly, and snorted: "You people - we haven't sold a @%#$%& beer all night." When I shrugged sympathetically, he added "Oh, well - at least your guys are buying Cokes. All those BYU people buy is bottled water." Secondly, BYU has a different kind of fan base: grown-ups acting like they're in high school, complete with pom-poms, air horns, and the like. They stood out in sharp contrast to the friends and families of our California players, who made up our smallish fan base throughout the tournament. There was one knot of particularly sketchy guys cheering for ORU, comprised of a couple of players' big brothers and their SoCal surfer buddies. At one point, the BYU fans decided that screaming for every hit and booing every questionable call was not enough, so they turned en masse to our side of the stands and launched into that old finger-pointing favorite, "WE GOT SPIRIT, YES WE DO, WE GOT SPIRIT, HOW ABOUT YOU???" Which was met with resounding silence from the ORU family and friends, who simply looked at around at each other in bemusement. Again, they persisted: "WE GOT SPIRIT, YES WE DO, WE GOT SPIRIT, HOW ABOUT YOU???" Which went on three or four times before, after a quick huddle, the small band of surfer dudes responded with: "WE GOT ONE WIFE, YES WE DO, WE GOT ONE WIFE, HOW ABOUT YOU??" And, I have to to give those Cougar fans credit: after their initial shock, they hardly missed in beat in replying: "WE GOT MORE!! WE GOT MORE!! WE GOT MORE!! WE GOT MORE!!
    2 points
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