MGN Went To Champaign
To see the women's team hoop vs Illinois
“That evil ‘I’ is everywhere!” — Kid MGN.
I took the family up from MGN HQ in St. Louis, MO up to Champaign, IL to see the Mean Green women’s basketball squad to see the game against the Fightin’ Illini. State Farm Center, once known as Assembly Hall, was renovated about ten-years ago and has that new-upon-old look about it. It used to be the largest domed arena until the Astrodome was built in 1965. The ideals of spectator sports have changed in the last 60 years, and more loge and luxury were added. Previously it was about sight lines and capacity. Now it is about comfort and experience.
We drove through snow, and -1º weather to get to the town — about 2.5 hours away. My guesstimate was that we’d be six of about ten total Mean Green fans. I think I undersold it. I saw one parent, and two other green-clad people. So that’s about eight total Mean Greeners in town. After the game, Illini head coach Shauna Green said there were about 4,000 in attendance (generous) which was good given the conditions. It is the midwest, so folks were much more ready to navigate the snow and cold than your average North Texan.
Fortunately for Yours Truly, a little under a half-decade in STL has provided some advantage in this area. We were fine. Afterward we had dinner and someone generously paid for our meal. Can’t complain.
The Game
North Texas was an underdog coming into this game, against a Big Ten team that had won some nice games to that point. I texted former voice of the Women BB squad Zac Babb and he said “We’ll hold our own. But they’re good”. And so it came to pass.
I took all four of my children but only two are playing basketball now. They just started and I’m happy to say that I’ve infected them with the hoops-loving virus. My eldest: “Watching this game makes me want to go play again.”
We practiced good cheering etiquette — for example saying “Go Mean Green” when they were shooting a free throw. Again my eldest also enjoyed their chicken nuggets promotion being thwarted. “I’m glad we ruined their nuggets thing.”
They came away with a healthy sports hate of the Illini after all of this. It was very cute.
From a basketball perspective, it was a game of superior skill vs a scrappy, effortful squad. I say that not knocking our ladies, but to simply acknowledge that Illinois had more women who could pull up in transition and hit an 8-foot jumper than we did. They had more ladies who could drive, get bumped, and finish a running layup than we did. They had more women who could shoot from distance than we did.
North Texas’ offense tries to get the ball inside, but Illinois was equally big, and was not bothered by Megan Nestor or anyone else. North Texas’ physicality bothered them, but to the point of annoyance of their head coach, “we knew it was going to be a physical game.” Later when North Texas was down ten with about 2 minutes to go, the fans above us were shouting to “Call off your team! You are down ten! You are going to hurt someone! Have some class!”
Aysia Proctor thought that was hilarious. I did also. The idea that you would stop competing is silly. North Texas was not and does not play dirty, but they compete. They gave Illinois lots of effort but could not find the easy buckets to stay in the game for the middle portion of the game. The threes from Schissler came a bit too late, and served only to cut it to ten.
The Mean Green finish this week with Oral Roberts December 18th and Santa Clara on December 21st.