Red Raiders credit crowd for fueling comeback
Before Saturday’s game, an official from the National Invitation Tournament called Texas Tech coach Pat Knight with a warning.
“If you get two thousand people in the building,” he said, “that’s pretty good for these things.”
Tech’s attendance was nearly triple that. Despite snow and spring break, the Red Raiders drew 5,465 fans to United Spirit Arena for their second-round matchup against Jacksonville.
Knight said it made the difference in pulling out a 69-64 win.
Texas Tech head coach Pat Knight salutes the crowd with his guns up after the Red Raiders defeated Jacksonville. (Geoffrey McAllister/Avalanche-Journal)
Jacksonville's Chris Edwards, left, fouls Texas Tech's Mike Singletary as he pulls him to the floor during the second half of their second round NIT college basketball game Saturday, March 20, 2010, in Lubbock, Texas. Saturday, March 20, 2010 (Photo by Geoffrey McAllister/Lubbock Avalanche-Journal)
“I don’t think we would have won without them,” Knight said. “The atmosphere was great. They were into the game the whole time.”
It helped that the smaller-than-normal crowd sat closer to the court. During regular-season games Tech monitors personal seat license seats and keeps general admission ticket holders from moving into them. The result is often large empty areas in the lower level.
Because the NIT is a separate event, though, season-ticket holders had first dibs at their regular seats. Then other fans were assigned the empty spots around them.
After Tech’s lackluster start against Jacksonville, forward Brad Reese said he could see a difference when the crowd saw the team taking back control.
“The first half we started off really sluggish, but in the second half we got some steals, hit some shots, and the crowd got really into it,” Reese said. “That’s when we got into an offensive rhythm.”
Knight had an idea that might happen. Plenty of times throughout the Big 12 Conference season Tech held substantial first-half leads on the road, only to watch them disappear as opposing fans energized an arena.
It happened at Texas, Texas A&M and Nebraska. So on Saturday when it seemed possible to be on the receiving end of all that support, Knight used the idea to motivate his team.
He couldn’t have asked for a better setup than D’walyn Roberts’ dunk to give Tech its first lead with 14:51 left in the game.
“I told them at the timeout, ‘If we can take the lead this place is going to go nuts,’ ” Knight said. “The way we did it was even better.”
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This athletic team found itself after the season was over. Only congratulations are in order here. One more road win turns a “Let’s get ride of the coach season” into a successful season.
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well I am suprised that the bandwagon types and t-shirt fans are not writing all these stories of congrats to the team. maybe they made one too many trips down to the local store and fueled up last night.
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Post season wins are exciting and can energize a program. Great job Coaching staff preparing your team to win in the “second” season. Tech’s players are to be commended as they continue to march through March. Lubbock fans came out to support this team and the two complimented each other. Great story. Keep up the great work Pat, Coaches, players and fans!
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We just beat two really mediocre teams. One had their coach fired and the other is the fighting dolphins. Sad that we are getting so excited over such a small amount of success. Lowered expectations.
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It’s still the NIT!
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I am mad at Pat because he did not allow sonny boy to play BB!! I am telling the Board of Regents if we don’t get it our way!
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Realfan…………………..you know nothing!
SH had 19 wins, many in a tough conference, JU had a 20 win season!
Sad that you don’t understand what it takes to WIN!
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Let’s see now; wins over two Southland Conference level teams at home in front of an average of about 3K people. Wow, what an uprising. So what if the students are on spring break, they don’t come to the games anyway. It wasn’t snowing at gametime and the streets were clear, so where were the “fans”? Maybe Tech should start selling tickets at $9 and $4 and quit selling season tickets. Many of these season ticket holders don’t come to the games so why bother. Those are the ones’ that are counted in the “attendance” numbers but aren’t actually in the seats.
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Well freddie, last I checked, Seton Hall played in the Big East, a pretty good conference and hardly relative to the Southland. While they certainly weren’t near the top, they did finish at .500 in that conference, no small feat.
Using your logic, let’s take a look at the Southland Conference. Did you notice that Sam Houston State, of said SLC, took Baylor down to the final 2 minutes and played them straight up throughout in a hotly contested game before losing? Well?
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Great game guys. Sorry it was not on TV. Now lets take care of business and bveat Misissippi.
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Sorry guys, great game, wasnt on espn because Gerald didnt make a deal with the devil Quick enough? Great game, KEEP GOING!!!!
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XRaider……………4-12 in the Big 12 is unacceptable. We are not Knight Jr’s learning curve. It was a bad hire 2 1/2 yrs ago, no experience, no chance. We have a talented team that can not win, whats missing?
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“Real Fan” & “Big Fan” are delusional. Do they not see this as progress? Do they not want Tech to win?
So what if this is the NIT? I think the NCAA tournament results are showing how many good teams are out there & how much parity there is in college basketball.
I was at the arena yesterday. Jacksonville played very well. Tech didn’t play poorly.
This post-season success can only build confidence, especially if it continues to New York City.
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One more thing.
It’s always bothered me to be at the arena and see all those empty seats close to the court. It looks bad on TV, and it’s annoying to be told by overzealous staff, “Those seats are reserved!” Reserved for whom???
This setup & atmosphere was so much better.
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Clay, I agree it is sad, but the truth is if you dont win games, fans wont come, sorry thats how it is, no offense to you or your opinion.
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Texas Tech has a great basketball team, don’t forget we are in the Big 12! One of the most difficult conferences in the nation, on that 7-game losing streak most of the losses were by 5 points or less! Quit making it sound like Tech sucks, are y’all forgetting that they beat a very good #10 Washington team earlier in the season?! This NIT run will definitely improve the team’s play next year. Go hate somewhere else, like on the UT website.
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Experience……… this run will pay off down the line!
For both players and staff!
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CZ did you notice that only Baylor is still in the Tournament. Maybe we are not that great a conference after all.
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Is there any talk of redoing the PSL situation at any time in the future? Reducing the number of PSL seats? It would be nice to get more of the fans that really want to watch basketball closer to the floor.
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Thrash–You forgot Kansas State.
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That would be a great idea, to sell tickets to people that really want to go to the game. Sounds like a tax write-off or fair weather fans waiting for that championship season. I would recommend buying at&t stock instead of the tickets. I sense big returns.
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Big 12 a big bust in big dance.
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Big XII has two teams in the Sweet 16. That is under expectations, but since only the Big 10 has more(3), I don’t know how anyone can gripe too much. 10 conferences represented of the 16 teams, so there is little room for any conference to look dominant at this point. Plus, it isn’t like the BigXII has had a rash of big upset losses like the BIg East. 8-9 and 7-10 matchups are really not big upsets, so it is pretty much Kansas that dropped the flag for the conference.
NIT berths aren’t great, but hopefully the extra games and practice time will help the team next year, since most should be returning.
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